Tag: Fighters

“It’s like that old story. You can’t keep snakes in your backyard and expect them only to bite your neighbours. Eventually, those snakes are going to turn on whoever has them in the backyard,” said Hillary Clinton about Pakistan in 2011. The remark by Clinton, the US Secretary of State, is reverberating as the Taliban, nourished by Pakistan, prepares to bite back the hand that fed them. Around 15,000 Taliban fighters are marching towards the Pakistani border, according to reports.

The escalation comes after Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan provoked a strong response from Afghanistan’s Taliban regime, that has condemned the attacks and vowed retaliation.

This situation compels us to examine how the Taliban, whose return to power in Afghanistan was hailed as a “blessing” by Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Imran Khan, has turned against it. Why has the Taliban, nurtured by Pakistan for years, now turned into a Frankenstein’s monster?

Pakistan now faces a dual Taliban challenge. The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which operates against Islamabad from areas along the Afghan-Pakistan border, and the Taliban that is in power in Afghanistan.

PAKISTAN JETS HIT AFGHANISTAN, TALIBAN VOWS RETALIATION

The current escalation began with Pakistani airstrikes in eastern Afghanistan, specifically in the Paktika province. These airstrikes, aimed at dismantling a training facility and targeting Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), resulted in the deaths of 46 people, mostly women and children, according to Taliban officials.

A Pakistani official said the strikes targeted “terrorist hideouts inside Afghanistan, using a mix of jets and drones”.

The Taliban in spokesman in Kabul said that the defence ministry vowed retaliation for the attack that it called “barbaric” and a “clear aggression”. Afghanistan’s Foreign Ministry in Kabul also summoned the Pakistani envoy and lodged a strong protest over the strikes.

That is why around 15,000 Taliban fighters are reportedly marching from Kabul, Kandahar, and Herat towards the Mir Ali border adjoining Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

The ruling Taliban in Afghanistan and the TTP, which Pakistan calls a threat, are separate but allied groups.

TERROR ATTACKS GO UP IN PAKISTAN: DEALING WITH TWO TALIBAN GROUPS

Following the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan, Pakistan has witnessed a spike in terror attacks as the new regime has emboldened and strengthened the TTP. The TTP aims to establish an Islamic emirate in Pakistan, just like its brother-outfit did in Kabul.

A report by the Islamabad-based Center for Research and Security Studies revealed a 56% rise in fatalities from terror attacks in Pakistan in 2023 compared to 2022, with over 1,500 killed, including 500 security personnel.

The relationship between the Afghan Taliban and Pakistan’s government has been further strained after Islamabad accused the Kabul regime of cross-border terrorism. Islamabad has imposed trade restrictions, expelled some 5,00,000 undocumented Afghan migrants, and put in a stricter visa policy. Military actions on the TTP have continued too.

Pakistan, which had hoped Kaul would take care of the TTP, has turned hostile to the Taliban regime in Afghanistan after lack of action.

The Pakistani military strike on Afghan territory comes just days after the TTP attacked a checkpoint in the country’s northwest, resulting in the deaths of 16 Pakistani soldiers.

The souring of relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan is, therefore, a result of Pakistan’s long-standing policy of supporting terror groups in the region, a policy, and the outcome that is, in some ways, validated by Hillary Clinton’s snake remark.

HOW PAKISTAN HELPED TALIBAN THRIVE

The relationship between Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban, that has turned sour, is rooted in the ever-changing geopolitical equation of what foreign experts call, the Af-Pak region.

Since its inception in the mid-1990s, the Taliban, which was then reared to destabilise the Soviet-backed regime, received significant support and backing from Pakistan. The notorious Pakistani intelligence agency, ISI, played a crucial role in the formation and sustenance of the Taliban for decades.

In 1996, Pakistan was one of only three countries that recognised the Taliban’s Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan as a legitimate government.

Pakistan, according to several experts, provided the Taliban with military advisers, experts, and even combat troops, including members of its Special Services Group commandos. However, Islamabad has repeatedly denied the claims.

This support continued despite international pressure and UN Security Council resolutions calling for an end to aid due to the Taliban’s hosting of al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden.

In pursuit of “strategic-depth”, Pakistan, for decades let the radical militants, many of them who later joined hands with the Taliban and other terror groups, grow along its northwestern borders.

PAKISTAN USED TALIBAN TO EXPORT TERROR TO INDIA

Pakistan has also been accused of using the Taliban as a strategic tool against India to deal with the Kashmir-issue covertly.

Groups like the Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) operated with tacit support, receiving training in Taliban-controlled areas throughout the 1990s and 2000s.

However, this proxy misadventure of Pakistan seems to have backfired. It has given birth to what experts call, ‘Pakistan’s dual-Taliban problem’, substantiated by the rise of the Pakistan Taliban or the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban coming to power in Kabul.

Despite diplomatic efforts and being patient, Pakistan feels that the Afghan Taliban has not done enough to combat terror activity across the border.

Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), although a separate terror group from the one in Kabul, is known to have a tacit understanding with the Afghan Taliban. Pakistan claims that the Kabul Taliban is unwilling to take action along the porous Afghanistan-Pakistan border, and that is complicating the situation.

Pakistan’s long game of playing both sides with the Taliban has come back to bite it, proving the Hilary remark valid. What Pakistan once nurtured as a strategic asset is now a volatile force threatening its own stability.