20 May 2007
A serious blow to Taliban’s dreams
The
Taliban-led insurgency in Afghanistan seems to be in trouble. After it had lost
three of its prominent commanders, namely Mullah Akhtar Osmani, Maulvi Kalam,
and Mullah Obaidullah, in December 2005, September 2006, and March 2007
respectively, it recently lost Taliban’s most prominent and feared combative
commander Mullah Dadullah Akhund (41) in a US-led operation in the southern
Afghan province of Helmand.
Like
in Iraq, where the death of Al-Qaeda regional chief Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi has
not reduced violence, the demise of this one-legged ruthlessly efficient
commander, known as the Butcher of Kandahar, may not lead to a quick end of
terrorist attacks in Afghanistan. However, it is widely agreed that the killing
of Dadullah is a serious blow to the Taliban’s dreams as his shoes will be
difficult to fill. It is likely to affect Taliban’s field strategy, deflate its
morale, and probably weaken its supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar’s grip on
the movement’s military affairs.
This
is not surprising as Dadullah was the driving force behind the successful
regrouping of Taliban militants last year and the mastermind of this year’s
spring offensive. Despite his poor strategic background and lack of education
and wealth, he succeeded in emerging as an unchallenged leader in the
battlefield, using his accumulated experiences from the years of jihad against
the Soviet invading troops in the 1980s and years of fighting anti-Taliban
militants in the 1990s to derive loyalty and respect among his men, as well as
among pro-Taliban tribesmen in Pakistan. His popularity was also attributed to
his mingling with his soldiers, fighting alongside them, and suffering the same
harsh conditions as them, unlike other Taliban’s leaders who have been hiding
in caves since their humiliating defeat in 2001.
Such
popularity, influence, and prominence of a man whose name had not been familiar
until the late 1990s (when he significantly contributed to the control of the
northern city of Mazar-e- Sharif and led a massacre of ethnic Hazaras in
Bamiyan province) was said to have spited some of Taliban’s top leaders,
particularly Mullah Jalaluddin Haqqani.
Haqqani,
who was appointed by Mullah Omar as the deputy chief of the Taliban movement
last year, was reportedly in disagreement with Dadullah over several issues,
including cooperation with Al-Qaeda and contacts with Islamabad. According to
several Pakistani analysts, Haqqani,
whose son Nasiruddin is of an Arab mother, was in favour of including Arab
mujahiddeen belonging to Al-Qaeda into operations against Kabul and NATO-led
forces, while Dadullah was firmly against the idea as he did not want Al-Qaeda
capitalize on the Taliban’s success.
Haqqani
was also against a reported peace deal struck in 2005-2006 between Dadullah and
the Pakistani establishment, under which the Taliban would use the Pakistani
province of Waziristan for moving men and supplies against a pledge to control
Waziristan’s tribesmen and fundamentalist militants opposed to President Pervez
Musharraf’s regime and divert their hostility towards NATO troops rather than
Islamabad. To Haqqani, the deal was to help pro-US Pakistani regime and
Islamabad’s strategic interests in Afghanistan. But to Dadullah, it was a
tactic that has indeed helped the Taliban.
However,
the main reason behind their differences was said to be competition over
influence in Waziristan, where Haqqani has long enjoyed influence and
repeatedly claim that more than 30,000 young Waziris were at his disposal for
suicide attacks. Haqqani was annoyed and felt sidelined by Dadullah’s efforts
to personally contact Pakistani Taliban and tribesmen in Waziristan and build
influence among them. It was such efforts that resulted in the recruitment and
training of thousands of young Pakistanis, with whom Dadullah managed to expand
Taliban operations beyond the movement’s traditional area of influence in the
southwest provinces. This, of course, was accompanied by a propaganda campaign
aimed at resonating with Afghans with memories of jihad against the ‘godless
Soviets’ in the 1980s, promoting the idea that the insurgency was against the
subjugation of Afghans by the infidel armies of the West, and urging the people
to leave areas controlled by these armies.
With
Dadullah’s demise, therefore, Haqqani can restore his influence in Waziristan
and within the Taliban leadership and emergence as the real commander in charge
of military affairs, especially considering that Mullah Bakht Mohammad,
Dadullah’s newly appointed successor, lacks charisma, influence, and
experience. Given the fact that Haqqani, a non-Kandahari figure, was not part
of the original Taliban movement and only joined the group dominated by
Kandahari Afghans in the mid-1990s following its emergence as a powerful force,
his control of the field affairs could lead to new alliances and changes.
Based
on the aforementioned story, many observers listed Haqqani among those who
would benefit from Dadullah’s death. On the other hand, Islamabad seems to be
among the losers, in addition to Qatar-based Al-Jazeera TV channel, on which
Dadullah has regularly appeared, and Waziristan’s bazaars, which have made lots
of money out of selling DVDs and video cassettes showing Dadullah’s
ruthlessness including beheadings.
Academic
researcher and lecturer on Asian affairs
elmadani@ batelco.com.bh
Additional
Reading :
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/taliban/