Every single Afghan provincial capital on the northern border has fallen to the Taliban, and the western border is long gone as well. Friday, the Taliban looked to cap off a very successful week by sweeping through the south.
The big prize of the south, Kandahar, already fell to Taliban control on Thursday. Lashkar Gah had similarly been on the cusp of falling for over a week, and went quickly in the face of the latest push, and the Taliban advanced into Uruzgan and Qalat, as well as the Ghor Province’s Chagcharan.
The fighting has gone largely as it had in recent days, with the Taliban showing up in numbers and rapidly taking control with little to no resistance. Seven days of this has the Afghan government on the brink of an outright military defeat, and an attack on Kabul seemingly only a matter of time.
Beyond Kabul and its immediate surroundings, the Afghan government largely holds just the southeastern corner of the country. That hold, like everything else, is tentative at this point.
Territory losses have the entire country either fallen or under direct threat. After decades of slowly encroaching around urban areas, the Taliban is sweeping everywhere, and overwhelming security forces.
The South is the stronghold of the ethnic groups that predominate in the Taliban, its original home base. The fighting in the North was a serious question, now decided, but fighting in the South was always a foregone conclusion once things reached this pass.