He Kabul ilemma

E good guys are losing. The bad guys winning. And India stares at a crisis

he civil war in Afghanistan came home on Friday, with the formidable Indian photojournalist, Danish Siddiqui of who was embedded with Afghan security forces, ed by the Taliban in Kandahar. Siddiqui’s tragic th has led to an outpouring of grief globally, but it e latest symbol of the tragedy that is unfolding in hanistan. The Taliban remains a monstrous e, committed to a medieval form of an Islamic irate, but it is winning. The Afghan government ains determined to preserve the Republic, with emocratic values, but is struggling to hold on to er. The international community (read the ted States and its western allies) is still holding on he fiction of a peace process and political lement, but can’t wait to flee after having ravaged country for 20 years and left it without any ainable and resilient institutions to defend ocracy. And India is stuck, caught between its es and principles it holds dear and immediate tegic interests and imperatives. istilled to the core, at the cost of being simplistic, e is a 20-year history of Afghanistan. Wounded by 9/11 terror attacks, the United States (US) decided as time to invade Afghanistan to kill Osama Laden, dismantle al Qaeda and oust the ban, which had provided State support and ctuary to the terror outfit. The last objective was fairly quickly, and a new interim authority led Hamid Karzai took office. But it took the US 10 rs to find and kill bin Laden; al Qaeda changed its m and its ideology and leaders also found a home ther terror outfits; and the Taliban went to istan and waited. lamabad and Rawalpindi, compelled to take part he Us-led “war on terror”, figured that eventually Americans would go back home. Uncomfortable h a democratic regime in Kabul which wanted to rient Afghanistan’s domestic and external ectory and have balanced ties with other South an countries, particularly India, Pakistan boured, supported, funded, and armed the ban and other proxies — even as it pretended to with the US in cracking down on terrorism. shington, first distracted by the flawed invasion aq and then war fatigue back home, vacillated ween the objectives of merely defeating terror nation-building. It achieved neither successfully. as the politics of nationalism intensified in the Washington began looking for an exit. Pakistan n pretended to be the good guy facilitating peace, a staggering degree of spin about how there is a d Taliban and bad Taliban began doing the nds. The US special envoy for Afghanistan, may Khalilzad, in a desperate bid to emerge as ce-maker irrespective of the terms of the peace, eased the Taliban, even as the Afghan ernment got weaker every day. nd so now there is a descent into chaos, to use med Rashid’s evocative title of a book on hanistan-pakistan. The Taliban is officially ticipating in a peace process, but is on a military nsive. In two months, it has taken over one-third he country’s districts; captured crucial border ts; penetrated Kandahar; and caused massive lian suffering in terms of death and lacement. Ashraf Ghani, the Republic’s sident, in an interview with put up a ve front and said while the Taliban has won les, the Republic will win the war while still nting to the need for a political settlement. The has claimed that it will not recognise any forceful ture of power, but the Taliban intends to change balance of power irreversibly, leaving little ice. The West is slowly reconciling itself to a ban-dominated regime in return for guarantees ecurity; China, Russia and even Iran seem to e cut bilateral deals with the Taliban; and despite radic differences with the Taliban, Pakistan ms to be smiling all the way to Kabul. dia is in a tough spot. Delhi recognises the threat Taliban poses to not just its security but dernity. But it has little leverage to influence the come. It is unhappy with the manner of the US , but can’t change that either. To secure its tical, diplomatic and developmental investment fghanistan, it wants to support the Afghan ernment, which is indeed putting up a fight, but knows that there is little choice but to deal with Taliban, a force that it so dislikes for the right ons. Between the right side and winning side, ia will have to strike a balance to protect its core