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Home Comments Analysis Does the West understand the Taliban?

The Killid Group

Does the West understand the Taliban?

Written by Killid
Saturday, 03 July 2010 15:18

 

A new American general is poised to take command of the counter-insurgency strategy in Afghanistan; Kabul is rife with rumours of the Pakistan-brokered meeting between President Karzai and Sirajuddin Haqqani, the operational leader of the most violent of the insurgents groups and on Wednesday morning the insurgents demonstrated their growing striking power with an attack on the Jalalabad airport.

But how much does the international community really understand about the insurgents it is combating and reconciling with? A new report 'How Tribal Are the Taliban', authored by Thomas Ruttig of the Afghan Analysts Network argues that there is considerable confusion about the identity and motivations of the Taliban, and this makes it difficult to shape any strategy to combat, counter or co-opt them into the polity.

Under what circumstances would the Taliban continue fighting and what might motivate them to enter into peace talks or reconcile with the mainstream? Is there a moderate element? Are foot-soldiers likely to respond to completely different incentives? Ruttig, a former diplomat with years of experience in Afghanistan, responds to the questions while challenging the current policy that is based on a distinction between reintegration and reconciliation.

Myths on Afghan tradition

Despite a considerable body of literature on the Taliban, there has been little rigorous analysis of their operational structures, motivations and identity. Perceptions of the insurgent group have been tailored to fit military and political strategies to counter them rather than the other way round.

The new report argues that myth-making by Afghans as well as foreign observers has contributed to a warped understanding of the major insurgent group. Describing the Taliban as a network of networks Ruttig argues that religious, tribal and regional components overlap in the organizational structure of the Taliban.

Though 'jirgas' and 'shuras' have now become the buzzwords  in the race for 'Afghanisation' of the war effort, with western diplomats emphasizing the importance of traditional Afghan structures of decision-making and conflict-resolution, there has been less focus on how these structures may have been vitiated or compromised by the protracted conflict.

Ruttig argues that thirty years of conflict have increasingly weakened and dissolved the traditional social and political relations in Pashtun society and weakened the authority of the mechanism of the jirga. While some shuras still represent a form of traditional self organization, many are convened by local strongmen he says. Similarly many tribal leaders were eliminated initially by the Soviet backed regimes and later marginalized by the emergence of armed commanders and drug barons who usurped their authority.

The Taliban continued the killings of the tribal leaders and the marginalization of tribal authority continued under the current western-supported Karzai regime with the government providing none or little backing to tribes that attempted to enforce decisions for the good of their communities - for example by banning poppy or keeping the Taliban out of their area. "It seems that the Kabul government perceived tribal self-organisation as a threat rather than a stabilizing factor and prefers a form of patronage that is not inclusive but serves only one side" says Ruttig.

Network of networks

According to the report the Taliban combines a hierarchical structure with a horizontal operational flexibility making it a network of networks and giving it both the cohesion and elasticity that has prevented a major split. The movement, it says, has shown more continuity than discontinuity in the pre and post-2001 phases. There is no recognizable 'moderate' Taliban in terms of ideology though there may be tactical differences with one group seeing the utility of talks and the other preferring a military approach towards the same goal.

While the Taliban are more overwhelmingly Pashtun, says Ruttig, they are not representatives of the interests of the community. However the alienation of some Pashtun tribes by the government's selective favouring of a few tribes, has created conditions in which the Taliban may find a supportive environment. Sympathy within Pashtun communities that has even enabled recruitment "is less due to Afghans' sympathies for the Taliban than to lack of any significant political middle ground….

between the Taliban and the deeply corrupt and therefore unattractive Kabul government." The armed conflict has narrowed the political space available so that "in today's violent atmosphere, between the anvil of the Karzai government and the hammer of the Taliban, there are no viable political alternatives for Pashtuns."

Broad based political approach

Terming attempts to make tribes into instruments for stabilization, as has been done in the formation of local defence initiatives as "misdirected" Ruttig says alternative Pashtun political and social organisations should be given more scope. The current technical approach towards the Taliban problem is encapsulated in the artificial divisions between reintegration and reconciliation which underestimates the political motives that drives the insurgency, he argues.

The June peace jirga the report argues has not brought the necessary clarity to the process. It was neither genuinely representative and nor was it preceded by broad consultations. The jirga rather showed that motives of power and control still dominate the peace and reconciliation agenda says Ruttig, but points out that the discussions showed there was a broad potential for a genuine reconciliation process. This however needs to have the buy-in of Afghans rather than a top-down approach which would always be vulnerable from spoilers.

 

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