As the Taliban causes havoc on the battlefield and with terrorist attacks, The Cipher Brief asked Daniel Markey, a former State Department official and senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations to weigh in on the outlook for Afghanistan. Markey says the Taliban’s car bombing in Kabul on Tuesday is symbolic and a reminder that the Taliban can strike anywhere. But the attack needs to be viewed separately from the gains the Taliban is making on the battlefield.
The Cipher Brief: Some reports claim that the Taliban is at its strongest since 2001. What is your assessment of the Taliban’s current strength and capabilities? What does Tuesday’s attack demonstrate about the Taliban’s abilities?
Daniel Markey: It’s somewhat difficult to determine whether the Taliban is at peak strength since 2001, but I will say that, in terms of the overall threat that the Taliban poses to the state of Afghanistan, it’s at least as high as it was in the 2008-2009 period prior to the Obama administration’s surge. And given the limited number of international forces in Afghanistan and the likelihood that that number will stay low, this Taliban offensive threatens to take the state past a breaking point in a way that we haven’t seen basically throughout the entire period that U.S. and NATO forces have been engaged there since 9/11.
In regards to this particular attack, it’s important to separate Taliban battlefield advances across the country from these kinds of spectacular terrorist attacks in Kabul. The two are obviously linked, but they are a very different sort of dynamic. An attack like this is really intended to send a broader public message– that is to demonstrate not only that the Taliban are still there but that they can attack anywhere in the country that they choose, even some of the most sensitive sites in Kabul, which is supposed to be the most heavily fortified city in the country. By doing that, they can send a shudder down the spine of Afghans everywhere else – as well as a message to international audiences, including the United States, that they are a real force to be reckoned with.
TCB: Where are the current Taliban strongholds in Afghanistan?
DM: What we’re seeing are significant advances in the south, in Helmand province. Some of that I believe is related to the poppy harvests there, which is a major source of income both for criminal organizations and the Taliban themselves. So they see Helmand as important terrain for moneymaking and that helps them finance their efforts. Also in the north, we had the problem in Kunduz last year that continues to be a source of some concern. Both sides seem to see that as vital strategic terrain to go after. And the areas around Khost, bordering tribal areas in Pakistan and closer to Kabul, have always been a strategic stronghold for the Taliban.
TCB: Last week, the Taliban declared that it would be launching the “Spring Offensive.” What is this strategy?
DM: The Taliban has launched a spring offensive every year, and traditionally what that has signaled is that the winter snows have gone and fighters should get back to work targeting international and Afghan security forces. That has been part of the rhythm of the Afghan fight. But this year, and it’s actually been true for years, there’s been a steady drumbeat of fighting throughout the winter, so the lag or lull period has been less significant. I mentioned poppy earlier. Poppy cultivation takes place in early spring so as that winds down, people who have been basically harvesting the poppy can now rejoin the fight. So it’s a call to arms for those fighters as well.
TCB: There have been allegations that the Pakistani government has provided safe havens for the Taliban. Do you see this attack as an opportunity for cooperation between the U.S. and Pakistan or could it create an even bigger divide between the two countries?
DM: Generally, the frustration that U.S. officials and Americans more broadly feel with Pakistan will continue to exist principally because it’s believed, and I think correctly, that the Taliban have enjoyed a haven inside of Pakistan. But even when Pakistan has undertaken offensives against its own insurgents, that is the Pakistani Taliban, in places like South Waziristan and now more recently North Waziristan, they haven’t targeted Afghans nearly so much as the U.S. would like. And even when Afghan fighters have been pushed out of Pakistan, it’s happened after the vast majority of U.S. forces left Afghanistan. So there hasn’t been what was originally described as a hammer and anvil approach, where the Pakistanis would push fighters out of Pakistan towards the U.S. forces who could wrap them up or kill them as they cross the border. Now, with U.S. forces at much lower numbers, pushing Afghan fighters into Afghanistan has actually created headaches for Afghan forces. Rather than targeting those fighters themselves, the Pakistanis have left that to the Afghans and the Afghans aren’t well equipped to do it. So there’s still a tremendous amount of frustration within the U.S. for what Pakistan has and hasn’t done.
One other thing to note is that a lot of hope has been placed on what are called reconciliation talks, in part hosted by the Pakistanis. So far, we haven’t seen nearly enough progress in those talks. With this major attack in Kabul, there will be a lot of questions as to whether the Taliban have any intention of signing onto talks anytime in the near future.
TCB: How could Tuesday’s attack affect U.S. policy in Afghanistan?
DM: Anybody who’s paying attention back here in Washington will be that much more reluctant to scale back U.S. forces before the next administration comes into the White House. There has been some effort to undertake holding actions to ensure that Afghanistan’s security doesn’t deteriorate too much further between now and next year when we’ll have a new U.S. administration. The Obama administration will probably see the attacks as more reason to slow down the planned drawdown from about 9,800 forces to about 5,500. If anything, I expect we’ll see calls to keep the number where it is now and probably to intensify the targeting with air power by the U.S. military and making it possible for U.S. air forces to go after Taliban forces in ways that should make life somewhat easier for the Afghan army and national security forces. So we can expect to see an opening of the rules of engagement to some extent for U.S. forces, keeping numbers similar to where they are, and possibly moving troops around. We already saw about 800 U.S. forces move down to Helmand to help out there. There may be more of the same in the months to come because of these kinds of attacks.
TCB: How will this attack impact the broader fight against the Taliban?
DM: The critical thing to recognize is that the fight in Kabul is an important one, but where we’re seeing the real battlefield shifts are elsewhere. These spectacular attacks have a real symbolic quality to them and undercut confidence, but the actual military moves are happening throughout the country in a fairly wide and comprehensive way. It’s not just a matter of firming up security in Kabul or resolving one specific line of threat. It’s broader than that, it makes it a lot harder, and that means we have fewer quick fixes. This is going to be a headache, certainly for the rest of the Obama administration but almost undoubtedly well into the next administration—something they need to be planning for.
