Afghanistan, what Happened and what can Happen!

Statement of the Political-Executive Board of the Left Party of Iran (People’s Fadaian)

Afghanistan, what Happened and what can Happen!

It has been two weeks since the fall of the Kabul government and the tragedy of the return of Taliban to power. By withdrawing its forces and NATO from Afghanistan, the United States fulfilled the agreements it had made in Doha. On the other hand, the Taliban forces, who were able to overcome the whole country by their reliance on the US decision to definitively leave the country and benefiting from the chaos in the Kabul government, are now in a hurry to consolidate their power and inauspicious domination.

Although there has been resistance to the Taliban in parts of the country, there have also been interactions with Islamabad and Doha on the issue of the form of the government. In this country, on the eve of formation of the new government, there is a brisk market of political stances and messages containing threats and encouragements from countries near and far.

Although there is still a great deal of uncertainty about the course of events and the reshuffle of forces over the Taliban's return to power, this does not preclude the need for a preliminary assessment of the situation in Afghanistan. Based on the existing evidence and with regard to the background of the "issue", the present statement seeks to consider possible perspectives arising from the arrayal of forces within and around the country,

The US Flip-Flop Policy Towards the “Afghanistan Issue” and Its Deadlocks

The issue of US arrivals and departures in Afghanistan is related to the position and priorities that this superpower has drawn for itself in the world over the past fifty years.

When Trump came to power, he laid the groundwork for a quick withdrawal from Afghanistan at the cost of full surrender to the Taliban and pursued a policy of bargaining by bypassing the US puppet government in Kabul. During the Doha talks, it was Trump who repeatedly and unilaterally gave concessions to the Taliban; On the other hand, nothing was heard but empty promises from the Taliban. He even ordered the signing of a definitive date for the full withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan without the slightest guarantee from the Taliban that it would reach an agreement with the Kabul government.

Biden inherited such a situation. A legacy that not only continued, but also raised Trump's American extravagance to the level of an auction. Like Obama, he saw the high cost of being in Afghanistan as contrary to US priorities, but he did so in the worst possible way and lost the game. The weakening of the link between the issue of the formation of an inclusive government in the Doha talks and the withdrawal of the United States from Afghanistan, and even worse, the announcement of a withdrawal order by Biden by the end of August relieved the Taliban.

The unrivalled United States not only failed in Afghanistan but was discredited around the world. If the damage to hegemonic relations is an achievement in the struggle against imperialist hegemony on a global scale, it ended at the heart of the Afghan battle at the cost of playing with the fate of a nation. Bringing Afghan women and historically oppressed people, such as the Hazara people, under the whip of a highly backward and ethnocentric current is one of the many side effects of this US approach. However, such an end was not inevitable.

In a nutshell, both 2001 military expedition to Afghanistan and leaving the country in such a way that it had no other name but to leave behind a flourishing civil society deserves condemnation. The failure of the United States in Afghanistan was both a failure of the US-sovereign unipolar world policy and a failure to impose a policy of domination on a world that was in turmoil. The Afghan swamp heralds the beginning of the end of the lion's share strategy in the world today.

However, the US withdrawal from Afghanistan can in no way be assessed as its farewell to that country's domestic policies and regional situation. It is likely that the United States is seeking to shift its military intervention policy to a policy of economic sanctions in order to form a less-favored Taliban government in Kabul. An approach that can already be traced back to the blockade of previously committed funds by both the United States and NATO.

The Kabul Government was a Precarious Puppet and Doomed to Collapse

With the US-led 2001 Conference in Bonn, a transitional government was assembled to leverage the establishment of a US favorable government and structure in Afghanistan. In that puppet government, no attention was paid to the need to bring the moderate Taliban sections to power structure, and there was not the slightest room for leftist forces. The government became objective only in the monopoly of the "Mojahedin" and with the supremacy of American agents.

Current Kabul is the scene of a united winner facing dispersed losers. Government losers, as a result of their losses and hostilities, are unlikely to be able to play a role in curbing the Taliban's rise to power. The lever of pressure on the Taliban at this stage should be sought in the agreements of the beneficiary powers in Afghanistan, and the main factor in dealing with the Talibanism should be seen in the long-term resistance of the people of this country.

Vulnerable Civil Society

Democracy in Afghanistan during these two decades had a superficial aspect and could not take the necessary root in society. The criterion in the political atmosphere of this country was not the civil rights of citizenship, but rather group and ethnic relations. What the United States did in Afghanistan after the Mujahideen's chaos and the vacuum after the Taliban dark era was first to rebuild and, more precisely, to build a military and law enforcement force and to form governing bodies under the banner of "state-building." This policy, however, because it did not have a strong national motivation and did not have popular support, did not take root, and did not get into shape. With the American puppet government, the result of the massive extravagance of the United States and the West could not be anything but a corrupt structure.

If in previous eras, the national resistance against the ruling power in Afghanistan was formed more in the context of ethnicity and naturally brought out ethnic and religious leaders from its heart, the main force of the anti-Taliban movement is civil and modernist force, even in connection with ethnic demands which are still active in this country. Afghanistan's civil society is now, in general, a vulnerable society, but it has a lot of resistance potentiality and is capable of producing leadership.

The Argument of the Taliban Survival and Growth and the Prospects for its Future

Although Taliban was formed by Pakistan and funded by Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, it is a mass movement with a social base rooted in tribalism and ruralism. Although the leaders of this movement have emerged from the heart of the religious schools of Quetta and Peshawar in Pakistan and have therefore taken the name of Taliban, in general, the Talibanism is fed on the "traditions" of patriarchal tribes. In a nutshell, the Taliban represents Pashtun fundamentalism and authoritarianism. Although Taliban is not centralized and does not operate under a single commander and leader, but the persistence and coordination in its ranks during these years was due to their anti-American alliance against the occupation.

The central issue at the moment, whether for the Taliban themselves or for the Afghan people and non-Taliban political forces, is the model and extent of the Taliban's rule in the land. Based on experience, not many deny the existence of the Taliban as a reality of the Afghan society. The debate is essentially about the dominance and the rule of those who, in terms of attitudes and beliefs, are the same Taliban as before. Any optimism about the reformability of the Taliban as a whole would be a dangerous assessment and a deadly political mistake.

Taliban-type government does not definitely have a future. Because it must deal with all kinds of crises, pervasive resistances, growing internal rifts, deadly financial bottlenecks, and finally the inability to strike a balance between the regional and world stakeholders on the "Afghanistan issue." But Taliban does not have such capacity.

The Taliban and the Outside World

The West's response to the tragedy in Afghanistan from the Western world and the United Nations and public opinion is still overshadowed by criticism of both the US government's behavior and the European governments' confusion about the realities of Afghanistan.

Although China has not yet indicated whether it wants to recognize the Taliban, it does seem to be counting on Taliban security in Afghanistan. Afghanistan's importance to this growing economic giant is being a gateway to Central Asia as well as a gateway to Iran and the West, and the Central Asian markets and the country's own pristine market on the one hand and discovered or producing gas, Iron, copper, cobalt, and precious stones resources, on the other hand, which have been valued at about $ 1 trillion in 2013. Recent assessments suggest that the world needs pristine sources of lithium to get rid of hard fossil fuels. The International Energy Agency estimates that demand for lithium will increase more than 40 times by 2040. There is no doubt that Afghanistan has an important place in the rivalry and economic war between China and the United States, and therefore Washington's military withdrawal from this country does not mean its retreat from Afghanistan.

Moscow is pleased with the US defeat in Afghanistan but has a problem with the Taliban's monopoly power. Russia is deeply concerned about its strategic depth zone on Afghanistan's northern borders with Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan, and fears the rise of Islamic terrorism within and around its territory. Russia, which counts on its coordination and cooperation with China on Afghanistan, appears to be pursuing a carrot and stick policy against the Taliban.

Pakistan, which considers itself the victor of the war, is now leading the way in the country's political arena. Among the powers in the region, Pakistan will certainly not consent for anything less than a lion's share of the power deal in Afghanistan. Islamabad is mostly behind a kind of Taliban-dominated coalition government. However, it should not be overlooked that the Pashtun Taliban's relationship with Pakistan is not guaranteed, and future divisions between the two should not be ruled out.

India, on the other hand, is unhappy with the Taliban's victory, calling it a victory for its rival Pakistan. Delhi is both concerned about the investments it has made in Afghanistan over the past two decades and, moreover, concerned about the impact of the Taliban victory on strengthening Kashmir's pro-independence Islamic movement.

Turkey, this political geography at the same time a member of NATO and a supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood Islam, has a dual stance on the developments in Afghanistan: victory for Islam against the West and at the same time, lest it turn against the interests of Turkey's friends in Central Asia. Ankara is monitoring the events in Afghanistan.

Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and regional sheikhs are expressing satisfaction with the Taliban victory and are following the political developments in Kabul. Those who should logically be among the first to recognize the "Islamic Emirate" as in the past are still waiting for the structure of power and circumstances, and in the context of ideological rivalries with each other (Brotherhood Qatar and Wahhabi, partly Salafi Saudi Arabia and Emirate), they want their share. The bottom line, however, is that building a strong Sunni stronghold in eastern Iran was part of their agenda of ideological-political warfare with the Shiite Islamic Republic, which they have now achieved.

As for Iran, Khamenei, intoxicated by the political and military defeat of the United States, sees it as a confirmation of his notions of "belligerent" and "anti-Americanism." The Islamic Republic, of course, defends the formation of a coalition government in Kabul and prefers to reduce the Taliban's share in it as much as possible. In any case, the victory of the Taliban will have serious negative consequences for Iran. One of its concerns is the growth of Sunni fundamentalism in the east of the country.

The dire consequences of the Taliban's dark domination of Afghanistan are not limited to the people of this country. The continuation of this dark domination may lead to bloody disintegration and cause dangerous and uncertain riots in the region. Taliban rule is a plague on Afghanistan, the region and humanity. Talibanism must be fought, and in these difficult days of the people of our neighboring country we must come out in support of their democratic and progressive struggles and accept Afghan refugees to our country with open arms.

Political-Executive Board of the Left Party of Iran (People’s Fadaian)

August 31, 2021