Remaining and expanding: what the Taliban’s return will mean for jihadi terrorism

Greg Barton, Deakin UniversitySpoiler alert: we are not winning the global war on terror. If the past 20 years of fighting terrorism by military means have shown us anything, it is that going to war makes things worse.

The direct costs in terms of human suffering – lives lost, societies destroyed and trillions of dollars spent – are multiplied by unintended consequences and cascading problems.

Invading Iraq in 2003 created a vacuum quickly filled with violent insurgencies that led directly to the rise of Islamic State and indirectly to a devastating decade of civil war in Syria. It did not make sense at the time and it certainly does not make sense now.

Launching a military campaign in Afghanistan weeks after the attacks of September 11, however, started out looking like a sensible response. Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda had planned and directed the attacks from the mountains of eastern Afghanistan.

It was there in the late 1980s, during the struggle of the Afghan mujahideen against the Soviet military, that al-Qaeda – “the base” – had been formed to support foreign mujahideen. The mission was to further radicalise and equip them to take jihad to the world.

The initial US special forces operation, which then Prime Minister John Howard insisted Australia join, had the goal of capturing or killing bin Laden and the al-Qaeda leadership. It also aimed to deny al-Qaeda a safe haven in Afghanistan to launch further attacks.

The Taliban regime that had come to power in Kabul five years earlier chose to protect al-Qaeda and suffered the consequences. Mullah Baradar and other Taliban leaders yielded power in Kabul in November, much more quickly than anyone had anticipated. They then staged a strategic retreat to insurgent mode.

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In 2002, mission creep saw an international coalition doing what many said should have been done a decade earlier when the Soviets left. For a moment, nation-building seemed to be working, but then attention turned to invading Iraq.

Some nation-building seemed to be happening in Afghanistan after September 11. Then came the invasion of Iraq.
John Moore/AP/AAP

Even without the distraction of marching on Baghdad and sinking into a rapidly expanding quagmire of our own making, pretty much every mistake in counter-insurgency and nation-building that could be made in Afghanistan was made. A brittle, corrupt, incompetent and highly centralised government in Kabul presented opportunities on all fronts to the Taliban insurgency.

Even after a massive military surge early in the second decade of the 21st century that saw 140,000 International Security Assistance Force NATO troops enter the conflict, the patient Taliban remained. Then, after the sharp drawn-down of international troops in 2014, the Taliban insurgency expanded.

Long story short, the war on terror, and fighting terrorism by military means, has been a largely unmitigated failure. Even in Africa, where failing states and jihadi insurgencies have demanded military responses, victories have been short-lived. At best, as in Somalia, they have resulted in costly stalemates.

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Military interventions have been costly and counter-productive

This is not to say the struggle against global terrorism has been completely without result. Elaborate terror plots targeting cities around the globe, first by al-Qaeda and then by IS, have been defeated and prevented on an impressive scale. But this has been achieved primarily by police-led counter-terrorism intelligence operations, working with communities, intercepting communications in terrorist networks and disrupting plots.

Military successes, such as the destruction of the IS caliphate in Syria and Iraq, have come not only at enormous cost, but also as corrections to problems created by military interventions.

Now in Afghanistan there is only failure. Two decades of significant achievement in transforming Afghan society, if not building robust government, have been washed away.

Not only that, the original success in defeating jihadi terrorism is also at an end, with the return of the Taliban and the success of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan project.

Developments in Afghanistan will be significant for at least three key reasons.

First, the triumph of the Taliban after two decades of struggle against the combined forces of NATO and the US is being seized on as evidence of divine approval for the global jihadist cause.

Ironically, although declaring a global war on terror proved to be a monumental mistake, jihadi movements such as al-Qaeda, the Taliban and IS are defined by their commitment to what they claim to be a holy war. That is why the success of Taliban, after 20 years of struggle, resounds around the world. And that is why, for all of their post-victory rebranding and social media information campaign, the Taliban, as a jihadi movement, remains bound to al-Qaeda.

Second, the mountains of Afghanistan will once again become home to mujahideen from across Asia and around the world. Jihadi camps in Afghanistan will return to making a significant contribution to the recruitment, radicalisation, training and networking of new generations of jihadi fighters and movements in South-East Asia.

The mountains of Afghanistan will again become training grounds for jihadi terrorists from around the world.
AAP/Australian Department of Defence handout

The Taliban regime in Kabul (or Kandahar) will, despite the Taliban’s existential commitment to global jihad, likely seek to distance itself from such camps. It will exploit plausible deniability, as it focuses on rehabilitating and reinventing its international reputation and securing the long-term viability of the Islamic emirate. This will potentially have the not insignificant benefit of restraining the Taliban from some of the brutal excesses of the past, particularly with respect to the oppression of women and the persecution of minority groups like the Hazara.

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As the Taliban surges across Afghanistan, al-Qaeda is poised for a swift return

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But it will also contribute to a third, more insidious challenge. As world powers like China and Russia, neighbours like Iran and Pakistan, and Muslim nations like Indonesia and Malaysia seek to engage with the emirate in order to moderate the Taliban regime, local Islamist groups will exploit the opportunity to push the boundaries of the permissible in South-East Asia. This is already on display with statements congratulating “our brothers the Taliban” from radical Islamist political groups such as the Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS).

The threat in southeast Asia

Over the past two decades, jihadi extremism with origins in the Afghan alumni – mujahideen trained and radicalised in Afghanistan in the 1980s and 1990s, and groups formed in Afghanistan such as Jemaah Islamiyah and the Abu Sayyaf Group – has been foundational to violent extremism in our region. This was amplified by a new generation of South-East Asian mujahideen returning from Syria and Iraq.

The stage is set for a new era of terrorist growth in South-East Asia and around the world. The IS motto of “remaining and expanding” rang hollow in the wake of the destruction of the caliphate.

Now, as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is set to eclipse the caliphate in scale and longevity, the jihadi catch-cry appears to have been met with divine vindication.

Greg Barton, Chair in Global Islamic Politics, Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Republic of Somalia’s jihad-related chaos and violence

In a report that comes as no surprise to many counterinsurgents, officials from the United Nations released a sharp rebuke of war-torn Somalia’s government. In its report, the UN officials called the Somali security and federal transitional government "ineffective, disorganized and corrupt" despite international assistance, reports Law Enforcement Examiner.

"Despite infusions of foreign training and assistance, government security forces remain ineffective, disorganized and corrupt — a composite of independent militias loyal to senior government officials and military officers who profit from the business of war and resist their integration under a single command," the report reads.

"Efforts to restore peace and security to Somalia are critically undermined by a corrosive war economy that corrupts and enfeebles State institutions… Commanders and troops alike sell their arms and ammunition – sometimes even to their enemies. Revenues from Mogadishu port and airport are siphoned off. Some government ministers and members of parliament abuse their official privileges to engage in large-scale visa fraud, smuggling illegal migrants to Europe and other destinations, in exchange for hefty payments," states the UN report.

According to officials, the extensive report should be released in New York City this week so members of the UN Security Council may peruse the contents.

"During the course of the mandate, government forces mounted only one notable offensive and immediately fell back from all the positions they managed to seize," the report read. "The government owes its survival to the small African Union peace support operation, AMISOM, rather than to its own troops."

During the 1990s, a group of Saudi-educated, Wahhabi militants arrived in Somalia with the aim of creating an Islamic state in this dismal African country. Also, the renowned Al-Qaeda established an operations base and training camp. They would routinely attack and ambush UN peacekeepers. In addition, they used Somalia to export their brand of terrorism into neighboring Kenya.

Leading members of Al-Qaeda continue to operate, mostly in secrecy, in Somalia and have built up cooperation with some of the warlords who control food, water and medicine. And the people of Somalia starve, mourn and die.

Since 2003, Somalia has witnessed the growth of a brutal network of Jihad with strong ties to Al-Qaeda. In fact, when the US forces faced a bloody battle in 1995 during what became known as the Black Hawk Down incident, it was Al-Qaeda joining with a local warlord who killed and wounded US special operations soldiers.

Somalia has been without a functioning national government for 14 years, when they received their independence from Italy. The transitional parliament created in 2004, has failed to end the devastating anarchy. The impoverish people who live in the ruined capital of Mogadishu have witnessed Al-Qaeda operatives, jihadi extremists, Ethiopian security services and Western-backed counter-terrorism agents engaged in a bloody war that few support and even fewer understand.

In an incident that gained American press attention, Somali-based terrorists armed with rocket-propelled grenades launched an unsuccessful attack on Seaborn Spirit as it rounded the Horn of Africa with American, British and Australian tourists on board. For unexplained reasons, the attack is being treated as an isolated incident and the terrorism link is being all but ignored by journalists. The term "pirates" is routinely used with only a few reporters calling the attackers "terrorists."

The ship came under attack during the early morning hours when the heavily armed terrorists in two speedboats began firing upon the ship with grenade launchers and machine guns. They assailents were repelled by the ships crew who implemented their security measures which included setting off electronic simulators which created the illusion the ship was firing back at the terrorists.

According to passenger accounts of the attack, there were at least three rocket-propelled grenades or RPGs that hit the ship, one hit a passenger stateroom without inflicting injuries.

When a Somali Federal Government was established in 2004, it remained a government in exile since the capital of Mogadishu remains under the control of a coalition radical Islamists who’ve instituted Sharia law and a justice system known as the Islamic Courts Union.

In the winter of 2006, Al-Shabaab initiated a large-scale insurgency using the same tactics as al-Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah, complete with assassinations of government and military officials and suicide bombings targeting aid workers and transitional government officials.

In their report, UN officials blame the government for its failure to control Somalia and point to a lack of professional commanders, and a military that resembles an amateur militia rather than a professional Army.

The UN report points out that The Somali National Security Force was meant to have 8,000 soldiers fully trained and deployed. However, as of the beginning of the New Year, there are fewer than than 3,000 fully trained and equiped soldiers.

"One of the reasons the Islamic Courts Union and Al-Shabaab have both been somewhat popular is because people were sick of clan-based politics," according to the UN report.

Western governments fear that Somalia’s instability may provide a safe haven for international terrorist groups. Al-Shabaab members have cited links with Al Qa’ida although the affiliation is believed to be minimal. The group has several thousand fighters divided into regional units which are thought to operate somewhat independently of one another.

The US has launched selected air attacks against Al-Shabaab leaders thought to have ties to Al Qa’ida, but analysts say this has only increased their support among Somalis.

The Western-backed Ethiopian military invaded Somalia in 2007, but many analysts believe this too augmented Al-Shabaab’s military campaign against the transitional government. The Ethiopians withdrew in January of last year after over 16 months of Al-Shabaab attacks on its forces.

The transitional government is preparing a major military offensive to retake the capital Mogadishu from Al-Shabaab and various other militant groups in the coming weeks.

Report from the Christian Telegraph