Is the Taliban wearing out its welcome in Afghanistan?
Tuesday marked the most violent day in Afghanistan this year, while
Afghans are starting to show that they're tired of violence and fed up
with the Taliban
![Bomb blast in Jalalabad, Afghanistan](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_tO9pmrF9B-NFgGAGdqvAmEOwMgZt0ANoxhWrRcGXudBbEM-9SfWvCpRkA5IfTdRUDmcJ8tix7_zFb1bloFW20RN1nAmnMs3kkzWmA0wqvzFJEHNUIJJjVpCDEgK4IVjA41bSTK-QOHDjpXi7yxkhrsDlI=s0-d)
Afghan Police officers inspect the scene after a bomb explosion in the city of Jalalabad east of Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, Aug. 13. At least five civilians were injured as a bomb targeting a government employees' bus went off Monday morning, a police source said. (Photo: Rahmat Gul/AP)
By Tom A. Peter
After US Army Staff
Sgt. Robert Bales allegedly walked off a US base in Kandahar last March
and went house to house, killing a total of 17 Afghan civilians, many
worried that the Taliban would capitalize on the incident and the long
restive province would revert to violence.
Yet more
than five months later, violence in Kandahar remains at record lows.
Compared with the same time last year, the Kandahar governor’s office
reports that insurgent attacks and activity are down 75 percent.
Marking
a new development, not only did the Taliban fail to use the shooting
spree as a propaganda tool to renew their momentum, but a growing number
of residents say they’ve grown frustrated with the group and
increasingly intolerant of its activities.
“The bad
behavior of the Taliban with the local people – when they use their
fields, houses, mosques, and streets as their battlefield, when they put
landmines in roads and in their fields – has shifted the sympathy of
the people toward the government. People are very unhappy with the
Taliban about these issues,” says Haji Fazel Mohammad, the district
governor of Panjwayi, where the Bales incident occurred.
Throughout
Afghanistan, many locals are losing whatever sympathy they may have
once had for the Taliban. In Ghazni Province in eastern Afghanistan, a
group of locals in Andar district rose up against the extremist group
after it shut down a majority of schools in the area.
The
uprising, which began in May, failed to spread beyond Andar and there
are a number of indications that local politics and power struggles may
have had just as much, if not more, to do with the uprising than
frustration with the Taliban. Most evidence points to a conflict between
Afghanistan’s Hezeb-e Islami, a more moderate Islamic group, and the
Taliban that has reportedly been taking place in Wardak and Ghazni for
some time now.
Afghan Police officers inspect the scene after a bomb explosion in the city of Jalalabad east of Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, Aug. 13. At least five civilians were injured as a bomb targeting a government employees' bus went off Monday morning, a police source said. (Photo: Rahmat Gul/AP)
Still,
as US and NATO forces work to hand over security responsibilities to
their Afghan counterparts ahead of the 2014 deadline to end their combat
operations, there is hope that evaporating support for the Taliban may
lay the foundation for long-term stability in Afghanistan.
“Much
like what happened in Iraq where there was a turning point after Al
Qaeda in Iraq had killed so many of the people and done so many
beheadings and intimidated so many, the people finally got tired of it
and stood up and fought back. That was the turning point in Iraq. The
same type of turning point can occur and will occur here,” says US Army
Lt. Col. Praxitelis “Nick” Vamvakias, commander of the 2-504 Parachute
Infantry Regiment in Ghazni Province.
Taliban have got the message
Unlike
in Iraq, locals say the Taliban received the message after the uprising
in Ghazni’s Andar district and backed off from some of its more
aggressive behavior.
“The situation is becoming
normal again after the uprising. There are no Taliban in the area where
the uprising happened. In the other areas of Andar where there was no
uprising, the Taliban’s behavior with the people has changed. They are a
little softer,” says Shahbaz, a farmer in Andar district who, like many
Afghans only has one name.
Additionally, throughout
Afghanistan, as in Kandahar and especially Ghazni, the Taliban remain a
considerable threat. Despite being an area of focus for the US military
this past year, with NATO forces tripling there, many areas of the
province remain restive and dangerous.
Within the
Afghan government, the Parliament has been so frustrated with its
military’s inability to reign in violence and stop assassinations that
it forced the resignation of the country’s minister of defense and
interior.
Afghans more pro government?
Even
if the Taliban continues to lose the support of the population, it does
not necessarily mean the local population is now siding with the Afghan
government and international forces.
With the
security situation and political future of Afghanistan still far from
stable or certain – yesterday marked the deadliest day of 2012 for
Afghan civilians – many analysts say that Afghans, especially those in
rural areas appear to be hedging their bets.
That the
US military and NATO will end their combat mission here in 2014 is no
secret, making many Afghans weary of looking to international troops for
enduring support. The Afghan government’s reputation for pervasive
corruption has also made a number of locals hesitant to place their
allegiances there.
“There are lots of people here in
Kabul who want to brand it as a kind of uprising that has ceased the
nation, but I think that’s too simplistic,” says Alex Strick van
Linschoten, an independent researcher and author of “An Enemy We
Created: The Myth of the Taliban/Al-Qaeda Merger in Afghanistan.”
Speaking
about recent security improvements in Kandahar, he adds, “It seems that
people are happy with the situation and they don’t want it to go back
how it was before, yet at the same time that doesn’t mean they think the
government is the greatest thing ever.”
Possible trend?
Amid
this climate, many Afghan observers say that its unlikely widespread
frustration will translate into a nationwide uprising, or even sweep
through the rest of Ghazni Province.
Few Afghans
possess the means to revolt. It is among the 10 poorest countries in the
world and has a per capita GDP of $528. Facing this level of
destitution, for Afghans living hand-to-mouth, abandoning their fields
or jobs to fend off the Taliban is simply not an option.
“Our
people are very poor. They are always worried about covering their
daily expenses and surviving. As long as they are uncertain about
whether their children can survive, how can they be ready for an
uprising? Economically, if they are supported and they are more secure
financially then I think in that case they will start to rise up against
the Taliban,” says Mohammad Isa Khan, a former attorney general and
independent analyst in Kandahar.
Comments