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Afghanistan Braces for New War

There is media buzz lately about an anti-Taliban insurgency struggling to be born in Afghanistan. A former Afghan army general, Sami Sadat, is returning home as the West’s favourite to don the mantle of leadership of a pan-Afghan “resistance” movement against repressive Taliban rule.

There is a lot of infighting amongst marginalised Afghan elites, civilian and military. Apparently, the western powers are trying to rally them behind Sadat. An axis between Sadat and Panjshir leader Ahmad Massoud seems to be the preferred option for MI6 and the US intelligence. Sadat and Massoud are both products of King’s College, London, known to be the recruitment centre of MI6, and British military academies.

The western powers, with the UN and EU support, made a determined effort in recent months to co-opt the Taliban leaders with seductive offers of financial help, easing of UN sanctions, etc. Indeed, the US holds the trump card as it is in a position to inject cash into the Afghan economy. Afghanistan has no money left after Americans took away their reserves.

But the Taliban didn’t take the bait, given their deep suspicions about American intentions and the West’s intrusive approach to prescribe norms of governance alien to Islamist ideology. After winning a 20-year war against the US, Taliban sees no reason why it should settle for a subaltern role.

Taliban has found it far more agreeable to work with the regional states, especially China and Russia, which steer clear of Washington’s exceptionalism and coercive diplomacy. The regional states accept Afghan ethos and traditions for what they are and understand the futility of forcing the Taliban to rule by western values. The regional states’ priority lies in the security sphere where they expect the Taliban to curb extremist groups and eliminate drug trafficking.

Indeed, such an approach can be productive. On April 3, Taliban announced the banning of cultivation of opium poppy, which is a big issue for regional states.

This humane thinking gets reflected in a statement by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Friday where he commended that the military-political situation in Afghanistan under the Taliban “has relatively stabilised.” Lavrov took note of “the efforts of the new leadership to return to peaceful life after a long armed conflict, to resume the normal operation of the national economy, as well as to ensure law and order and security.”

Lavrov said Moscow is satisfied that the level of cooperation is rising and Taliban’s attitude is “exemplary”. Beijing is in empathy with Moscow’s approach. Suffice to say, Russia and China are steadily advancing their diplomatic engagement of the Taliban regime. The Western powers are sensing that their space and capacity to bully the Taliban is rapidly shrinking.

After all, what is “international recognition”? There are no universal guidelines. If a regime is recognised by the country’s population, if there are no rival claimants to authority, and if it is capable of handling governance independently, it qualifies as the legitimate government of the state. Period. There is no question that the Taliban regime makes the grade. While Taliban does not require a determination by the international community to function as the government, formal recognition is useful and necessary to conduct diplomatic relations with other countries.

Clearly, the immediate purpose of a hurried Western insurgency in Afghanistan at this point is to create a rival counterpoint to power with a view to portray that the Taliban is not the only force in Afghanistan which is capable of running the affairs of the state. The proposed insurgency in May is in effect a trial balloon to see how far it will fly. Sadat told the BBC that he hopes to attract “moderate Taliban” as well — that is, MI6 and the CIA will split the Taliban.

Against the backdrop of the West’s confrontation with Russia and China, Afghanistan’s crucial importance as a regional hub of geo-strategy is self-evident. A recent report in Nour News, which is affiliated to Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, disclosed that “volunteers” drawn from erstwhile Afghan military and security forces, trained by US and British experts, have been deployed to Ukraine to fight the Russian forces. Conceivably, these “volunteers” are Sadat’s comrades-in-arms.

Sadat told the BBC that he has admiration for Ukraine’s resistance to Russia! And he hinted that he is in touch with the Ukrainian forces. “I think they (Ukrainian forces) are holding their ground pretty well. But I also tell them to, you know, believe in themselves more… I hope they will get continued (western) support as long as they need it.” It’s a small world, after all!

To be sure, Russia and China (and Iran) will counter the Western project to return to Afghanistan. On Friday, President Putin held a videoconference with the permanent members of Russia’s Security Council to discuss “issues that are of great interest from the point of view of national security … in respect to the events in Afghanistan and generally in that region, in that sector.”

The targeted attacks on Shi’ites in Afghanistan and the recent attempts to create misunderstandings between Iran and Afghanistan at the people-to-people level are perceived in Tehran as a conspiracy by external powers to sour Iran’s relations with the Taliban government.

Without doubt, Chinese Defence Minister General Wei Fenghe’s regional tour of Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Iran last week also factored in the direct and indirect fallouts of the developments in Ukraine on security relations in Central Asia. In his meeting with Kazakh president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, the Chinese general “called for vigilance about certain major powers interfering in Central Asia to disrupt and undermine regional security” (Chinese MOD readout).

The general told Turkmen President Serdar Berdimuhamedov that China “firmly opposes external interference in Turkmenistan’s internal affairs.” During his meeting with President Ebrahim Raisi in Tehran, the general underscored China’s readiness “to work with Iran to cope with various risks and challenges, safeguard the common interests of both sides and jointly safeguard regional and world peace and stability.”

However, at the end of the day, it is Pakistan’s role that is going to be vital. Pakistan’s equations with the Taliban have radically changed after the sudden replacement of the ISI chief Lt. Gen. Faiz Hameed in September by COAS Gen. Bajwa. Prime Minister Imran Khan’s overthrow further complicated the Pakistan-Taliban equations.

Taliban’s traditional position on the Durand Line; its reluctance to clamp down on Pakistani Taliban; the spike in terrorist violence in Pakistan; the distaste toward Taliban ideology among westernised Pakistani elites — all these have eroded the mutual trust between Pakistan and the Taliban.

Besides, Western powers and the Taliban do not need Pakistan anymore as go-between. Yet, apathy is not an option, either, for Islamabad. No doubt, Pakistan is going to be hit hard if an anti-Taliban resistance movement gathers momentum. There is bound to be spillover if western intelligence succeeds in splitting the Taliban. Anarchical conditions in Afghanistan can only play into the hands of external forces to destabilise Pakistan’s internal security.

Meanwhile, the US-backed regime change in Pakistan is not helping matters. The sooner elections are held in a fair and free manner and a new government with fresh mandate is elected, the better it will be for Pakistan. But the good part is that nobody is going to blame Pakistan for the resurrection of warlordism in Afghanistan.

Sadat has the reputation of being a very violent man whose assignment in Helmand was particularly bestial. In real life, Sadat held his military position while also making a fortune as the C.E.O. of Blue Sea Logistics, a Kabul-based corporation that supplied Afghan security forces with everything from helicopter parts to armoured tactical vehicles.

In a heart-rending essay in the New Yorker magazine last year titled The Other Afghan Women, well-known author and war correspondent Anand Gopal had a few things to recount about Gen. Sadat. Some excerpts here:

“During my visit to Helmand, Blackhawks under his (Sadat’s) command were committing massacres almost daily: twelve Afghans were killed while scavenging scrap metal at a former base outside Sangin; forty were killed in an almost identical incident at the Army’s abandoned Camp Walid; twenty people, most of them women and children, were killed by air strikes on the Gereshk bazaar … (Sadat declined repeated requests for comment.)”

When Sadat reached Kabul from Helmand on August 15, 2021 to take up his new assignment as commander of the so-called “special forces,” he saw that the Taliban was already at the city gates. And he was one of the first “evacuees” to escape to the UK from Afghanistan.

When Sadat returns now, the Afghan people will only regard him as an imposter. They deserve better. The West owes it to them after all the unspeakable sufferings they have been put through during the past 20 years of NATO occupation.

The plain truth is, the Taliban have been in the driving seat for only eight months. It is far too premature to condemn them. As Kathy Gannon, the veteran Afghan hand at the AP, said the other day, “I think there certainly is an effort on their (Taliban’s) part to try to get to a position where they’re actually governing the country. How they will get there and what it will look like is still unknown. And that’s really difficult for Afghans because they’re struggling with that uncertainty.”

(M. K. Bhadrakumar is a former Indian diplomat. Courtesy: Bhadrakumar’s blog, Indian Punchline.)

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Iran Makes Gains as Israel, Turkey Test Moscow’s Limits on Ukraine

The closure of Turkey’s air space to all Russian aircraft has not come as a surprise to Moscow, which is aware that Ankara and Washington are involved in a new dalliance and that there is a full spectrum calibration of Turkish regional policies under way.

The best evidence of it is that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan now says that a “reasonable, consistent and balanced relationship” with Israel is the only way to effectively defend the Palestinian cause, while Ankara’s rapprochement with Jerusalem solidifies despite intense tensions over the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

However, the closure of Turkish air space to Russian planes has broader regional implications. Russia has bases in Syria and although the conflict in that country has subsided, it remains “kinetic” with Turkey on the prowl with a large force of Syrian rebels it has trained and equipped over the last few years–at least 20,000 fighters following a unified command structure under what is being called the Syrian National Army.

Syria still matters

Suffice to say that Moscow, which anticipated the non-availability of the Turkish air space sooner or later, would have worked out alternate arrangements. The air route via the Caucasus and Iran is one option. Of course, Moscow and Tehran have congruent interests that the military balance in Syria should not tilt, although some redeployment of Russian forces from Syria to the conflict zones in Ukraine is to be expected.

Collaterally, Iran’s role as a stabilizer in the Syrian situation can only become more prominent. Meanwhile, Erdogan sees a window of opportunity to tiptoe around the presence of U.S. and Russian forces in northern Syria and take control over the Kurdish autonomous regions. Turkey has also moved hundreds of troops, armor, and firepower to boost its presence around Idlib in northwestern Syria, which, if Ankara fails to reach an understanding with Russia, could come under attack.

There was a time until recently when Moscow and Washington stood in the way of any Turkish offensive to take territory from Kurdish forces. But that looks like a bygone era now. Turkey finds itself in a far better position than ever before to cut the Gordian knot that thwarted its ambitions and delayed any large scale offensive to pursue those ambitions in northern Syria.

An opportunity for Iran?

This evolving segment of the Syrian conundrum must be bothering Iran. However, no less significant is the contradiction regarding Russia’s relations with Israel, which provided the latter the space to attack Iranian assets in Syria.

Iran is intensely conscious that Israeli intelligence is ’embedded’ in U.S. bases all across the region, which not only gives cover for intelligence gathering but also grooms Israel, as it were, for future roles as a subaltern of the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM)–the U.S. military’s command center which covers activities from Egypt and West Asia to Central and South Asia.

Last year in January, the Pentagon reported a change in the Unified Command Plan shifting Israel from U.S. European Command (EUCOM) to CENTCOM in a move envisaging the “strategic upgrade” of that country’s future role in West Asia as Washington pays greater attention to the Indo-Pacific.

All things considered, it must be a welcome development for Iran that there is greater clarity now about the limits to the Russian-Israeli relationship. Israel tried hard initially to remain neutral in the conflict between Ukraine and Russia and even projected an aspirational role as facilitator-cum-mediator. But the Biden Administration would have none of it and has come down on the Naftali Bennett government like a ton of bricks, demanding that it must behave like any subaltern is expected to do.

Israel-Russia relations are being tested

Israelis are realists. Which is why Foreign Minister Yair Lapid went down on his knees to explicitly accuse Russia of war crimes in Ukraine. But in the process, Lapid went somewhat overboard, as he chose a venue in Greece in the presence of his Greek and Cypriot counterparts to lambast Russia:

“A large and powerful country has invaded a smaller neighbour without any justification. Once again, the ground is soaked with the blood of innocent civilians. The images and testimony from Ukraine are horrific. Russian forces committed war crimes against a defenceless civilian population. I strongly condemn these war crimes.”

Lapid, a former general himself who is no stranger to war crimes, probably ingratiated himself personally with the Russophobic “hawks” in Washington, being Israel’s next prime minister. But he twisted the knife deep into the Russian consciousness. And Moscow’s reaction has been swift.

Not only was the Israeli ambassador summoned by the Russian Foreign Ministry but two other things happened in quick succession. First, in a not-too-subtle hint, Admiral Oleg Zhuravlev, the deputy chief of the Russian Centre for Reconciliation of the Opposing Parties in Syria, disclosed that a Syrian-operated, Russian-made Buk M2E air defense system had recently intercepted a guided missile fired from an Israeli F-16 fighter jet in Syrian airspace.

The disclosure of the Syrian interception was as good a warning as there could be that Russia might no longer tolerate future Israeli strikes against targets in Syria (which are mostly Iranian assets.)

Second, Putin himself appeared on the scene writing a letter to Bennett demanding that Israel should transfer control of Jerusalem’s Church of St. Alexander Nevsky to Russia, as was promised by Netanyahu as part of a deal two years ago to win the release of an Israeli-American national detained in Russia on drug charges.

This latter issue will be a bitter pill for Bennett to swallow–to transfer to Russia the custodianship of the church located in Jerusalem’s Old City. The church is of exceptional importance to the Russian Orthodox Church and is a place of pilgrimage for Orthodox Russians who are inextricably linked with the rising tide of Russian nationalism.

A Voice of America report lost no time in noting that “the issue is one of the latest flashpoint in the increasingly contentious relations between the two countries during the Russian war against Ukraine.”

Long-term planning

While Israel has a parochial and time-serving foreign policy, what distinguishes Iran’s compass is its sheer breadth of strategic vision. Iran understands perfectly well that the west is pursuing dangerous intentions in the Ukraine crisis.

Tehran sees through “the west’s strategy of turning Ukraine into a deadly quagmire for Russia to create the conditions for the west to play a more active role on the world stage, especially in the eastern hemisphere, by removing it from the list of major players on the international stage,” as an influential Iranian commentator wrote last week.

Conceivably, Iran’s best hope and interest would lie in Russia’s success in overcoming the crisis which may lead to a reset of the world order in the direction of greater multipolarity away from the prevailing western-led political and financial systems.

Evidently, the Biden administration is taking its own time to reach an agreement with Iran on the lifting of sanctions against Iran. It is baiting Tehran with patently-contrived, fantastic propositions almost on a daily basis: while Washington may remove the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) from the terror list, its elite Quds Force shall remain branded as such; and so forth.

However, the heart of the matter is that the Biden administration’s foreign policies are currently Russia-centric (rather, ‘Putin-centric’) and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Washington is seeking reasonable certainty that Iran is willing to distance itself from Russia. The specter that haunts the Biden administration is the sheer possibility of two energy superpowers–with ideological affinities for a just and equitable world order and multipolar trade and currency regimes–working in tandem, which the U.S. is hard-pressed to counter effectively.

(M. K. Bhadrakumar is a former Indian diplomat. Courtesy: The Cradle.)