Indian Defence Review

The lack of success in operation enduring Freedom in Afghanistan results from the US-led coalition’s failure to develop and implement, jointly, a coherent strategy for its conduct that integrates counter-insurgency, counterterrorism, and stability and reconstruction operations. The International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), internal cohesion for development of the Afghanistan operation, is becoming increasingly fragile. The willingness to share risks has become a key issue. National caveats are increasingly disputed. Not all North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) member states are prepared to send their forces into combat. This puts the fundamental principle of alliance solidarity on the line.

As long as parts of Pakistan serve as a safe haven for the Taliban and Al-Qaeda, coalition forces will not be able to control Afghanistan.

Above all, the conflict has increasingly become a regional one. Taliban bases in Pakistan cannot be targeted by coalition forces; however, logistical and armament supplies out of Pakistan are significant, and Pakistan is used as a recruitment base. As long as parts of Pakistan serve as a safe haven for the Taliban and Al-Qaeda, coalition forces will not be able to control Afghanistan.

The endgame of the US-jihadist war in Afghanistan has, therefore, to be played out in Pakistan. Osama bin Laden and the al Qaeda command cell are located in Pakistan and have all the signs of having regenerated to an alarmist proportion. Ever since their egress from Afghanistan in November 2001, the Taliban’s command and control structures have re-established themselves in Pakistan, directing insurgency propaganda and activities from a safe haven  close to the border with Afghanistan. Furthermore, the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) have become a training ground for an array of actors intent upon driving out NATO forces from Afghanistan. Bolstered by support from elements of Pakistan’s overbearing military establishment, the Taliban have established firm roots within these regions. Parts of Waziristan in NWFP are now controlled by militant Islamists, with the harsh social rules imposed upon Afghanistan in the late 1990s taking hold.

In less than three years, the NWFP has seen the exit of three governors. From Lt-Gen (Retd) Syed Iftikhar Hussain Shah to Commander Khalilur Rehman to Lt-Gen (Retd) Ali Mohammad Jan Aurakzai, all three governors of the NWFP had to bow out of office, all trying to grapple with an increasingly difficult and complicated situation in FATA. And it wasn’t just the governors; political agents and several other senior civil officials, were all tried and tested and then shown the door in an unceremonious manner. These changes indicate a faltering policy, if there ever was one, to rein in a growing militancy in tribal borderlands.1

Another reason for the inadequacy of ISAF operations is the lack of troops. Where the Soviets lost with 300,000 troops, the Americans and NATO are fighting with less than 50,000.

The war on terror should know no borders. The international community should address the root causes of terrorism-wherever they are. After the bloodiest year since the 2001 US-led invasion, it is clear that the NATO-ISAF coalition won’t make lasting progress in Afghanistan unless the militants’ ability to command and control the insurgency from across the border in Pakistan is tackled.

Another reason for the inadequacy of ISAF operations is the lack of troops. Where the Soviets lost with 300,000 troops, the Americans and NATO are fighting with less than 50,000. Any hope of defeating the Taliban, or of reaching some sort of accommodation, depends on isolating them from Pakistan. So long as the Taliban have sanctuary and logistical support from Pakistan, ISAF troops in Afghanistan have an uphill task.

Despite the bad faith in starting the operation, withdrawing from Afghanistan without defeating the Taliban and destroying al Qaeda is not a feasible option. Their presence is increasingly bolstered by foreign jihadists, many of whom have brought the tactics and modus operandi of the Iraqi insurgency into Afghanistan. Suicide bombings and sophisticated Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) are now commonplace. The response of President Musharraf oscillates between repression and accommodation, but ultimately net gains are being made by the insurgents, with the Karzai Government, the Afghan people and NATO forces left to pay the price. While the insurgency is sustained by cross border sanctuaries and support, disillusioned, disenfranchised Afghans are also responding to the call of extremists.2 Security for the people of the region is essential.

The Pakistani armys ability to carry out operations effectively on their side of the border is doubtful. It is not completely united and motivated in this endeavour due to its several competing interests. It is a complex and shifting constellation of relationships.

The coalition strategy in this global war against terror (now being realistically referred to as the ‘long war’) is seriously flawed. The Pakistani army’s ability to carry out operations effectively on their side of the border is doubtful. It is not completely united and motivated in this endeavour due to its several competing interests. It is a complex and shifting constellation of relationships. Since all events take place in the shadow of history, the historical context is important to understand the dynamics of the conflict and draw relevant conclusions and lessons.

An analysis of this jihadi war will be covered as under:

The Historical Context

The Afghanistan problem has to be seen in its historical context when the country became a buffer zone between tsarist Russia and the British Empire in India. It begins with the designs of the British colonial expansion and their desire to keep Russia out of the region. The machinations which followed as a consequence are called “The Great Game”. The power struggle led to the First Anglo-Afghan War between 1839 and 1842. This was followed by Russia capturing the ‘Afghan’ territories of Bukhara, Tashkent and Samarkand in 1865. When the British took control of Kabul after the Second Anglo-Afghan War, Afghanistan was forced to give up control of several frontier districts, including most of today’s FATA and parts of Baluchistan. The British had also devised a special legal structure for the FATA, called the Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR), which remains in place today. The guiding principle of the FCR was the creation of a buffer zone in the hinterland between British India and Afghanistan. This buffer zone fell within the Pashtun tribal area between Afghanistan and the NWFP.

In 1873, Russia established a fixed boundary with Afghanistan and promised to respect its territorial integrity. The British, however, fought the Second Anglo-Afghan War from 1878 to 1880. The border between Afghanistan and British India was drawn within this buffer zone in 1893 after the Second Anglo-Afghan War. It was drawn in such a way as to divide and weaken the eleven Pashtun tribes located there who periodically revolted against British colonial rule.3 The line became known as the Durand Line, after Sir Henry Mortimer Durand, the British civil servant who drew it. This line, along with the FCR, strengthened the buffer zone between British India and Afghanistan.4

Ever since their egress from Afghanistan in November 2001, the Talibans command and control structures have re-established themselves in Pakistan, directing insurgency propaganda and activities from a safe haven close to the border with Afghanistan.

The Third Anglo-Afghan War, leading to Afghan independence, was fought between 1919 and 1921. Kabul, which lacked a standing army, used the Pashtun tribes located on the Afghan side of the border in a revolt which led to Afghanistan’s full independence from the British in 1919.5 USA formally recognised Afghanistan in 1934.The twentieth century saw a weakening of the British Empire and increasing nationalist movements against British rule in both Afghanistan and among the tribes in the border regions.

After Britain withdrew from the region, and after the creation of an independent Pakistan, Afghanistan gradually came under Soviet influence. This was formalized when General Mohd. Daoud Khan became Prime Minister, in 1953. Two decades later, a military coup abolished the monarchy and the Republic of Afghanistan was established. The coup in 1978 was primarily against Soviet influence. It led to the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union on 24 December 1979. The US ambassador (Adolph Dubs) was killed and US assistance to Afghanistan cut off.

The decade from 1980 to1989 witnessed the Mujahideen rebellion against Soviet occupation, supported by Western countries and Pakistan by finance, weapons and training. The withdrawal of Soviet troops resulted in civil war between ethnic/tribal groups between 1992 and 1996 till the Taliban emerged as the authority controlling Afghanistan. While the matter of Osama Bin Laden’s training camps in Afghanistan was known for quite a while and the US had even launched cruise missiles attacks on them in 1998, followed by UN Sanctions (Resolution 1267) against the Taliban in October 1999 and additional Sanctions (Resolution 1333) against terrorism and narcotics in 2000. However, it was after the 11 September 2001 attacks that the US-led coalition invaded Afghanistan under Operation Enduring Freedom and ousted the Taliban regime.

The war on terror should know no borders. The international community should address the root causes of terrorism”¦

The Karzai era then followed with his appointment as President of the Transitional Government. It was followed by the Bonn Agreement, which set out a road map for new a Constitution, justice system, democracy, reconstruction and reconciliation in Afghanistan. NATO took over responsibility for the security of Kabul in 2003. Karzai was elected President in 2004 and the Berlin donors’ conference pledged US $8 billion over three years for Afghanistan. It has done little as NATO had to expand its operations to the northern sector of Afghanistan and then the western sector in 2005.

In 2006, the Afghan Compact set out the framework for cooperation between Afghanistan and the international community for the next five years and NATO expanded its stabilisation to the southern and eastern sectors of Afghanistan as the Taliban insurgency gained momentum in the summer, leading to their control of Southern Afghanistan this year. It is now increasingly clear that the ISAF operations are not making headway and Afghanistan stands to revert to the situation that obtained seven years back. At present, neither side can hold sway over the other. They also do not have the ability to absorb or partially subdue the other side in this conflict, where memories run deep.

The Pashtunistan Angle

The Pashtuns in Afghanistan are the largest ethnic group in the country. They are concentrated mainly in the south and east. In Pakistan, the Pashtuns are found in the North-West region. The Pakistani part of Pashtunistan comprises an area that runs from Chitral in the north (where Pashtuns are a minority) to Sibi in the southwest and includes the ethnically mixed region of Balochistan. The Pashtun majority areas in western Pakistan include the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), Mianwali District and the northern portion of Balochistan. The main language spoken in the Pashtunistan region is Pashto.

Pakistan has more than double the number of Pashtuns compared to Afghanistan. After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, over three million refugees, mostly Pashtuns, migrated to Pakistan.

Pakistan has more than double the number of Pashtuns compared to Afghanistan. After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, over three million refugees, mostly Pashtuns, migrated to Pakistan. These refugees are not included in the official count of Pashtuns in Pakistan as they are not Pakistani citizens. The Pakistan’s Pashtuns have integrated into Pakistan and have representation in their armed forces, parliament, political parties, business and civil services.

Despite sharing a common language and believing in a common ancestry, Pashtuns have rarely been united and did not achieve unity until the 18th century, under Ahmad Shah Durrani. During the reign of Amir Abdur Rahman, in the late 19th century, the Afghans gave up nearly half of the Pashtun territories to the British who finalized the Durand Line6 as part of their permanent political border with Afghanistan. In 1905, the North-West Frontier Province was created and roughly corresponded to Pashtun majority regions within the British domain. The Federally Administered Tribal Areas was created to further placate the Pashtun tribesmen who never fully accepted British rule and were prone to rebellions, while Peshawar was directly administered as part of a British protectorate state with full integration into the federal rule of law.

At the time of independence from Britain and the creation of Pakistan, the Pukhtuns did not accept India or Pakistan and announced a boycott of the referendum to decide their future. The fiercely tribalist Pashtuns of NWFP, wary of Jinnah, asked for Pathanistan. The Pashtunistan issue caused diplomatic problems with Afghanistan, which was the only country in the world that voted against Pakistan’s inclusion in the UN. Relations between the two countries deteriorated and the Afghan government declared the Durand Line agreement of 1893 to be null and void. Afghan backed insurgents crossed the Durand Line from Afghanistan to openly combat the Pakistani military between 1950 and 1955, but the issue remained unresolved.

Pakistans security issues along its border with Afghanistan partially explain its support for insurgents in Afghanistan today. However, the militant camps established in western Pakistan also pose a threat to Pakistan itself, by abetting “the Talibanisation” of the NWFP.

Pakistan formally joined the CENTO and Afghanistan established closer ties to the Soviets who declared that they supported the right to self-determination of Pashtunistan. In the 1970s, the Pakistan government decided to support Islamist opponents of the Afghan government including future Mujahidin leaders Gulbadin Hekmatyar and Ahmed Shah Masood. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and civil war in Afghanistan sidelined the Pashtunistan issue.

Prominent proponents of the Pashtunistan cause included the late Khan Wali Khan and Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, who stated in the Pakistan Constituent Assembly in 1948 that he simply wanted “the renaming of his province as Pakhtoonistan, like Sindh, Punjab, etc.” Khan Abdul Wali Khan is remembered for having eloquently replied to a Pakistani critic of the Pashtunistan cause, who asked him if he considered himself a Pakistani Muslim first or a Pashtun, by stating that: “I have been a Pashtun for six thousand years, a Muslim for thirteen hundred years, and a Pakistani for twenty-five.” This has become an often repeated sentence by Pashtun nationalists. However, the Pashtunistan cause is often relegated to their tribal affiliation rather than nationality by independent Pashtun tribes.

The divide between Afghan and Pakistani Pashtuns was bridged during the Soviet invasion and subsequent civil war in Afghanistan as millions of Afghan refugees moved to Pakistan’s border region. This served to re-establish cultural ties; in fact, many Afghans settled and married into the population of Pakistan. Ironically, as time passed the initial whole-hearted welcome changed into antagonism amongst the majority of the Pakistani Pashtuns, who began to look upon the Afghans as exploitative and competing for the same resources, jobs and lucrative business trade existing throughout Pakistan.

Pashtunwali, the indigenous culture of the Pashtuns, and their pre-Islamic identity remains significant for many Pashtuns and is one of the factors that have kept the Pashtunistan issue alive. Although the Pashtuns are separated by the Durand Line, many Pashtuns, especially tribesmen from the FATA area, tend to ignore the border and cross back and forth with relative disregard. The rivalries of various ethnic groups, whose territorial boundaries do not coincide with the artificially created international border, is a major issue. The enduring conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan has its roots in this division of the Pashtun population – a deliberate British strategy of “divide and conquer” to weaken the fiercely independent Pashtuns and maintain Pashtun territory as a buffer zone. Pakistan has inherited and continued the British strategic policy of the buffer zone, which continues today as it cannot relinquish control of the restive tribal areas contiguous to the border without threatening its own territorial integrity.

Pakistan’s security issues along its border with Afghanistan partially explain its support for insurgents in Afghanistan today. However, the militant camps established in western Pakistan also pose a threat to Pakistan itself, by abetting “the Talibanisation” of the NWFP.

Afghanistan makes its core claim on the Pashtun areas on the grounds that Afghanistan is the original home of all Pashtuns. According to some estimates there are 30 million Pashtuns in Pakistan while 12.5 million in Afghanistan. Over 60 percent of all Pushtuns live in Pakistan, this includes Pakistani Pashtuns and about three to four million Pashtun refugees from Afghanistan.7 Pashtuns in Pakistan have also migrated heavily to other provinces within Pakistan with the city of Karachi in the province of Sindh now having the largest urban population of Pashtuns in the world (estimated at four million).

The Pakistani Government has little interest in the promotion of Pashtun culture. The widespread usage of Urdu and its use as the only national language of Pakistan has caused considerable resentment.

There are also sizeable Pashtun populations in Lahore (one to two million) and in Islamabad/Rawalpindi. Pashtuns virtually dominate the transport industry in Pakistan and are actively involved in business and trade throughout the country but particularly in areas outside of the traditional Pukhtunkwa areas.

The Pashtun ideal of equality is based on the tribal system. The idea is that all Pashtuns are born equal, and are children of one common ancestor; social and economic inequality, which of course exists, is not given by nature or birth but is achieved individually, and is threatened and open to change at any time. Pashtuns use their tribal order to mark lines of conflict and solidarity. If I see two men fighting I am supposed to side with the one who is “closer” to me, i.e. the one with whom I share the nearest common patrilineal ancestor.8 The Pashtun tribal system is one which is bound by a network of primordial obligations on the solid basis of well structured genealogical ties. Such notions are linked to pride and honour, not to inferiority. Whereas the tribal order discourages social hierarchy, it defines social nearness and distance.

The Pakistani Government has little interest in the promotion of Pashtun culture. The widespread usage of Urdu and its use as the only national language of Pakistan has caused considerable resentment. This resentment is shared by most of Pakistan’s provinces including a sizeable number of Punjabis who also do not have official patronage of their language. With the exception of Urdu (Language of the Mohajir) and Sindhi (which was introduced as a provincial language in the 1970’s after much protests and ethnic tension against mohajirs), no other indigenous ethnic group of Pakistan has official patronage of their maternal tongues.

Continued.: The Jihadi War – II