A senior British military official said Wednesday that the world should give the Taliban space to form a new government, arguing that the group could be more “reasonable” than during previous rule.
“We have to be patient, we have to hold our nerve and we have to give them the space to form a government and we have to give them the space to show their credentials,” said Gen. Nick Carter, the UK’s chief of defense staff. “It may be that this Taliban is a different Taliban to the one that people remember from the 1990s.”
The Taliban are currently engaged in talks on the structures of a new government with former Afghan officials, including former president Hamid Karzai.
“It may well be a Taliban that is more reasonable,” Carter said. “It’s less repressive. And indeed, if you look at the way it is governing Kabul at the moment, there are some indications that it is more reasonable.”
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid held a press conference Tuesday and said the group did not want to fight anymore. He also said a future government would allow women to work and attend school, something the Taliban did not permit when it ruled most of Afghanistan 20 years ago. Mujahid also said the Taliban would work to form an “inclusive” government.
There have been reports of violence in areas recently captured by the Taliban, but overall, there appears to be a relative calm across the country. Carter said the reports could be explained by the fact that there are different factions within the Taliban, and the violence might not reflect what the group’s core leadership wants to be happening.
“What we absolutely have to remember is that they are not a homogenous organization — the Taliban is a group of disparate tribal figures that come from all over rural Afghanistan,” he said. “Some of the behavior that we’re hearing reported at the moment may not be in line with what the political commission wants its country to be in the future.”
Only time will tell what Afghanistan’s future government will look like. Right now, it’s in the Taliban’s interest to keep the violence to a minimum as the US and other Western powers are evacuating their citizens.
Oh yeah, and the Taliban are to prove their sincerity by what, letting U.S. troops stay on at Kabul airport for NATO Europe Firsters?
After all, there’s a humanitarian crisis being staged for them to stay.
Offering Afghanis asylum in the West will lure in every desperately poor migrant within 30 miles to Kabul airport. The place will be like al Tanf, Syria only a little more posh.
“Oh yeah, and the Taliban are to prove their sincerity by what, letting U.S. troops stay on at Kabul airport for NATO Europe Firsters?”
So far as I can tell, the Taliban are not idiots.
Therefore, they know that US troops will stay on at Kabul airport for as long as they damn well please, and that accommodating that fact will cost them less than contesting it.
For the Taliban, letting the U.S. and NATO stay on in any fashion for any pretext, is just as fatal as contesting their stay.
Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov knows a thing or two about Western bloodsport diplomacy, after his nation was led into two futile bloody wars of secession against Russia.
‘Prepare for the worst’: Like Bin Laden, Taliban is another
‘American project’ & ‘US scam against Muslims’ – Chechnya’s Kadyrov, RT, August 17, 2021.
https://www.rt.com/russia/532308-kadyrov-us-control-taliban/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS
The U.S. economy can’t afford any more Euro-First geopolitical games.
It’s not up to the Taliban to “let” or “not let” the US stay on at the airport. As a tactical matter, the US is capable of staying there for pretty much as long as it pleases.
Trying, and inevitably failing, to contest that fact of reality would produce worse results for the Taliban (in the form of rubble and corpses) and better results for US hawks (“they’re ATTACKING us! We gotta do something!”) than ignoring it.
But if Biden’s smart, he’ll want to completely wash his hands of the place ASAP.
‘If’ Biden is smart, may be a lot to wish for. He could even keel over dead and President Harris will make the decision.
I’ve never had more respect for Biden as when he said he would not pass the Afghan war to anther President. He actually said something capital ‘P’ Presidential in the face of apparent overwhelming betrayal by his own military-intel corps.
I could also be wrong, and he knew it was always the plan to botch the withdrawal and force a stay behind Afghan human shields.
If the Taliban are independent and not captured from within as Kadyrov suspects, they will let the farce go on till August 31 as they have apparently agreed to.
After that, if the Taliban are really the Taliban, the U.S. is only staying on as an unopposed hostile force if they are willing to make a crater of Kabul.
Even then, the Taliban could simply move the capital and return underground. A few well-placed explosives could make short work of the runways at Kabul and Bagram.
There may or may not be a force of Afghan gladios willing to take up the fight and spearhead NATO’s re-invasion, but they are at a severe disadvantage. The Taliban may be feared, but not disrespected at large. The Afghans don’t appear to actually like or respect Americans or Euros; they just want something.
Unlike Al Tanf, the U.S. military does not have miles of desert between themselves and the closest opposing force. The enemy they earned, is the Afghan people. For every one they helped, dozens more were harmed. It was the system.
It is still a nation of warlords, tribes. Taliban are “farmers with weapons”. They will not change.
I believe that what will happen at that airport is mostly in the hands of one man namely President Biden. From all he has said thus far I deduce that our stay there will be limited in time.
I would not be surprised that we will eventually learn that an epic war between the military in the Pentagon and the civilians in the White House is currently raging.
If that is the case then let the White House win for the good of the nation.
I am somewhat surprised that Donald J. Trump has not (yet?) used the situation for a full-scale attack on Biden.
Because of Harris?
“I am somewhat surprised that Donald J. Trump has not (yet?) used the situation for a full-scale attack on Biden.”
Twelve statements in five days attacking Biden on Afghanistan.
Old saying; “A leopard does not change its spots.”