Taliban on the Run.... Or Just Digging In?
Looking beyond victory, by David Ben-Aryeah
16 November 2001
There has been an almost triumphant tone in broadcasts and articles over the past few days as the Taliban "fled" Kabul and other large areas of Afghanistan with the odd aside to the ferocity of the retaliations by mysterious sections of the Northern Alliance forces.
The overall picture to those who know not that beleaguered land and it's polyglot of tribes and peoples is "it's almost over -- we've got them on the run -- now we need a political solution."
To which there can only be one response: "It's NOT over, don't delude yourselves that they're on the run and it's going to take years for a political solution to be reached, never mind to work!"
Against a wishful scenario that the Taliban are "fleeing in confusion and disarray" comes the news that Prime Minister Tony Blair has authorized the immediate putting on 48 hours standby of thousands of British Troops to fly to Afghanistan for peace keeping and stabilization duties an act of political and military naivety that almost beggars description
and displays a lack of military history that verges on the irresponsible: the British and the Soviets learned at great and bloody cost that to 'stabilize Afghanistan' is a task that can envelope as many troops and materiel as you care to send and that the relentless "low intensity conflict" [to use that wonderful U.S. phrase for non stop guerilla war] can totally demoralize even crack troops [ask the Spetznaz who served in Afghanistan] and utterly devastate ordinary run of the line personnel.
It would appear that no-one caught up in the torrent of "gung ho" and "jingoism" has actually taken the time to work out how much a continuing war against experienced and fanatical fighters would cost in financial terms, never mind human ones: one of the contributory factors that ultimately lead to the financial collapse of the Soviet Union was the Afghan war which, despite using [and loosing] many mere conscripts, became a bottomless money pit into which billions of rubles were poured only to see the mighty Soviet military behemoth rattle it's way out years later back to mother Russia.
There is no doubt that the "fleeing in confusion" is part of a greater plan to withdraw from far flung areas of the country where logistical support would be impossible in the approaching winter and the lack of air transport (the coalition having destroyed most of the tiny Taliban air assets) and also enable their conventional (If that word can ever be used in respect of the Taliban) forces to concentrate in depth around Kandahar their spiritual capital in the mainly Pushtun area of Afghan and where they enjoy strong local support.
It is also necessary to clarify the myriad of "caves" that have been alluded to in the hunt for Osama Bin Laden...... many of these are not the cold and wind-swept natural edifices that we imagine.
During the guerilla war the then "plucky" Taliban were waging against the Soviet invaders, the elite Special Air Service Regiment (SAS) deployed personnel, in secret to Afghanistan to train and supervise the construction of several complexes of tunnels near Kandahar and also in some of the more remote areas of the country where Taliban commanders could take refuge to avoid the incessant air pursuit of the Soviets.
The tunnels were not that primitive, they had sound ventilation systems, good protection from even the largest of bombs and had excellent storage and accommodation.
IT would be extremely stupid to assume that the Taliban didn't learn well and that in the over ten years since the original tunnels were built they haven't built others in places we DON'T know about!
The Taliban fighters are extremely experienced in the adaptation (usually deadly adaptation) of weapons that western forces would consider unusable, I have seen rocket pods usually attached to Soviet helicopters reworked and mounted to deadly effect on the back of a jeep for close support fire.
Given the ever changing network of tribal loyalties, and indeed the survival of various
"warlords," one of whom seized a Northern town and then curtly informed the Northern Alliance to stay out "or else," the prospects of a broad spectrum Government do not look good -- an old 'Afghan hand' of many, many years experience once told me "they hate one another with an intensity that is hard to believe ...... the only thing they hate more are outsiders trying to run their lives and their country, indeed the most unifying event in the 150 years since the British in their red coats marched up the Khyber Pass was the Soviet invasion!"
Osama Bin Laden has almost been dropped from the coalition pronouncements and briefings. The war, as of this week is against the Taliban and until now it has been almost entirely one sided and this has, in many observer's eyes lead to a dangerous complacency in the minds of the general public -- a complacency that will be rudely shattered when the Taliban "dig in" to their well prepared position and resist with a determination and ferocity that will come as a terrible shock to the American special forces and the American public, who appear to be in a state of ignorance that many Taliban will joyfully fight to the death in the knowledge that they shall, surely, visit celestial virgins in paradise.
The "battle for Kabul" [if it could be described thus] was unbelievably quick and clean [unless you were a 'foreign' Taliban fighter where it became terminal].
Quite apart, from presenting the coalition with a real problem in respect of law, order and the establishment of democracy it also presented a great problem by far in respect of the wider reaction in both the U.S. and U.K. when -- on commencement of actual ground hostilities -- the body bags start coming home and people start asking of their leaderships apposite and probing questions.
Article contributed by Globalvision.org
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