Afghanistan, the Impossible War

Nine years after intervening with U.N. approval in order to end the Taliban regime, the United States and its allies are now looking for a way to leave the country.

Pakistan’s decision to close the Khyber Pass to the U.N. (through which arrive a good part of the supplies necessary for the 152,000 soldiers and military units against whom they maintain a continued conflict) reveals the growing difficulties facing troops in this central Asian country. Nine years have passed since the war began in Afghanistan, and the White House doesn’t have an exit plan for its troops, nor one that can guarantee governance of the country. In the middle of this chaos, neither Washington nor its allies seem to have come to the conclusion that they are facing a much greater problem: the extension of the conflict into Pakistan, which has 175 million inhabitants and is the only Muslim state with nuclear weapons. The war in Afghanistan has come to be known as the Af-Pak conflict, and it has enormous consequences for world security.

The Afghan President Hamid Karzai inaugurated the Peace Council yesterday, composed of government officials and tribal chiefs, in order to legitimize negotiations with the Taliban that were directly and secretly initiated this summer. Many of the 70 constituents of this council are old members of the Taliban or commanders from that guerilla war. Contact between the government and the most responsible Taliban members has grown in recent months, which in the White House has solidified the belief that Afghanistan is an impossible war, from which they can exit only through negotiation.

Experts point out that officials have reached this conclusion because the insurgency has changed the conflict into a war of exhaustion, in which time has no value for the guerillas who are driven by the ultimate goal of forcing the foreign troops to leave. In the overthrow of the Taliban and up to the end of 2001, 12 allied soldiers died. But you line their pockets with drug money, re-armament and the effective capture of out-of-work youths for the war, and the attacks against the allied troops have reached unbearable levels. So far this year, 563 soldiers have died in Afghanistan (most of them American), although other countries like the U.K. and Canada have also paid a high price. Both have already announced their withdrawal: Ottawa in 2011 and London in 2015.

Barack Obama’s strategy of increasing troops levels in Afghanistan by 30,000, with the objective of reducing the insurgency, “arrived too late,” according to many experts. The insurgency had grown to exponential proportions while Washington “was distracted” with the campaign in Iraq.

According to The Guardian, the Afghan government had even talked to the Haqani clan, who Pakistani intelligence describes as the main guerillas, the most powerful and the most radical. Yalaludin Haqani earned his reputation as a guerilla commander during the war against the Soviets (1979-1989), in which he also established intimate links with the CIA and Osama Bin Laden, one of the Saudis who financed the conflict against the communist infidels. From there comes his connection with al-Qaida, which he maintains, and his intimate ties with Pakistani Taliban members and the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

The intervention of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries to facilitate contacts between the Afghan government and the insurgency has allowed Haqani’s men to initiate negotiations without the previously required condition that the foreign troops leave first. But while the negotiations get started in Kabul, the situation gets complicated on the other side of the so-called Durand line, the border carved out by the British Empire that divides the Pashtun people between Afghanistan and Pakistan and is accepted by no one.

“There is no justification nor explanation” for the increased bombings by American unmanned planes on Pakistani soil against the Taliban and members of al-Qaida in which civilians also die, a spokesperson from the Department of Foreign affairs declared yesterday.

Last week, the deaths of three Pakistani soldiers involved in the raiding of a NATO helicopter put the country on the war path. Eighty percent of the supplies destined for troops stationed in Afghanistan pass through Pakistan, and now only the Quetta pass is open. Thousands of trucks await the reopening of Khyber, and the Taliban has already set fire to more than 80 vehicles.

The radicalization of Pakistan is the worst thing that could happen to the international community. Washington has apologized for the attacks and yesterday the E.U announced terms for Pakistani imports. Dialogue and diplomacy are emerging as the principal weapons of the Af-Pak conflict.