The West-Taliban alliance
The decades-long conflict in Afghanistan was always far more than a simple case of the Taliban versus the Afghan government, or a USled "war on terror." This is because Afghanistan is not a single country in the sense of a legitimate system accepted by the vast majority. Beyond the capital Kabul, it is more a mosaic of local areas with factions - among them the Taliban - seeking rule and profit.
The suicide bombing of the crowd outside Hamid Karzai International Airport by Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISIS-K) on August 26, killing up to 170 Afghans and 13 US troops, highlights the threats presented by these armed groups.
The Taliban will try to establish a national government. With their radical interpretation of Islam and politics, they are likely to continue violence, repression and denial of rights to many sections of Afghan society. But as demonstrated by the ISIS-K violence, the Taliban's control of Kabul and also other parts of Afghanistan is not secure.
To understand that lack of control - and the instability and insecurity that are likely to persist - one has to begin with the relationships between the Taliban and other groups, including ISIS-K and the Haqqani Network.
Islamic State Khorasan
Islamic State's lightning advance across Iraq and Syria in 2014, and its declaration of a "caliphate," spawned affiliates. These groups promoted the ideological line of, and received assistance from, the core of ISIS - but developed from local conditions.
One was ISIS-K, established in January 2015 and naming itself after "Khorasan," part of an Islamic empire that stretched from Iran to the western Himalayas from the 6th century.
The group consists of local militants and former Afghan and Pakistani Taliban, pushing an even more radical ideology and implementation, as well as some former al-Qaeda members. Spanning the Afghan-Pakistan border, ISIS-K's center is in eastern Afghanistan, in Nangarhar and Kunar provinces.
While the Taliban sought to take control of Afghanistan, through military operations and then political talks, ISIS-K has sought to recruit members by generating publicity through deadly attacks on civilian targets. Their targets have included protest rallies, schools providing education for girls, and a
Kabul maternity ward.
Afghan security forces and US aerial operations, including the "mother of all bombs" in April 2017, crippled ISIS-K. And beyond Afghanistan, the US killing of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in northern Syria in October 2019 was a further blow. By 2020, ISIS-K's estimated membership was reduced to between 1,500 and 2,200.
But a new commander, Shahab al-Muhajir, energized the group with operations such as an August 2020 attack on a prison in Jalalabad, some 100 kilometers west of Kabul, which freed hundreds of fighters. There was also as an assassination attempt on vicepresident Amrullah Saleh, which left 10 people dead.
Al-Qaeda and
Network
When Western media and pundits report on the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, they often unsurprisingly invoke the specter of alQaeda. A UN report in June said alQaeda members were active in 15 of the 34 Afghan provinces. But in both operational significance and political authority, the organization
the Haqqani is a shell of its 2001 version.
Soon after the terrorist attacks on the US of September 11, 2001, al-Qaeda was pushed into northwestern Pakistan, with Osama bin Laden finally killed by US Special Forces in 2011.
Other senior leaders have been slain or captured. While bin Laden's successor Ayman alZawahiri is thought to be in Afghanistan, he is muted and said to be in poor health.
In contrast, the Haqqani Network is at the heart of Afghanistan's contest for power. Hailing from southeastern Afghanistan, Jalaluddin Haqqani established the group in the 1980s, soon receiving assistance from the Ronald Reagan administration in the US and Pakistani intelligence to fight Soviet forces.
After the Taliban rose to power in 1996, Haqqani accepted a cabinet post as minister of tribal affairs.
The US-backed overthrow of the Taliban in 2001 forced the network to regroup in Pakistan, but it soon pursued cross-border operations. It intersected with al-Qaeda, both in ideological positioning and in training camps.