Taliban Takeover Of Afghanistan Changes Region’s Geopolitics

Each step the Taliban are taking to consolidate their hold over Afghanistan since taking over the country in a blitz is triggering major changes across the region and afar. After their two decade-long involvement, US and NATO forces are no more major players, their hasty departure forcing Afghanistan’s neighbours to deal with the mess left behind. Can Pakistan, China, Russia and Iran help stabilise Afghanistan as they all jostle to get their particular interests accommodated by the Taliban? Moreover, amidst all this jockeying for power and influence in Afghanistan, will China fill the vacuum left by the US?  

“China has openly expressed its view that US presence in Afghanistan was responsible for the mess. China has also kept ties with Taliban, including hosting their delegation led by Mullah Baradar. However, the assumption that China will be the beneficiary is I believe premature,” says Aparna Pandey of the Washington-based  Hudson Institute.

The schadenfreude collectively felt by China, Russia, Pakistan and Iran at the utter and unlovely chaos emanating from America’s impetuous retreat may evaporate unless a modicum of order is established and the new Taliban government quells the distrust of most Afghans. A stable Afghanistan remains the ultimate goal of all reg­ional stakeholders, but despite the Taliban’s easy military victory, resistance to them can accelerate. Ahmed Massoud’s defiance in Panjshir is an early glimpse of that.

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With a Taliban government installed in Kabul, Pakistan, prima facie, has eme­rged as the clear winner. The Pakistan military and ISI were the guiding spirits behind the creation of the Taliban and helped them gain power in 1996. Even while being a US ally in the Afghanistan war, Rawalpindi provided the Taliban crucial sanctuary. Its acrimonious ties with former presidents Hamid Karzai and Ashraf Ghani are a measure of Pakistan’s loyalty to the Taliban.

In recent years, Islamabad had watched with concern India’s growing footprint in its backyard. It had used the Haqqani network to intimidate New Delhi through attacks on Indian interests across Afghanistan. The Indian emb­assy in Kabul was targeted in 2008, with devastating effect and again in 2009. Indian consulates in Herat, Jalalabad, Mazar-e-Sharif and Kandahar were also targeted. Now, with the Taliban as its willing instrument, Islam­a­bad will try to eradicate all Indian presence and influence in Afghanistan. On its part, Islamabad has long accused India of using its Afghan consulates to foment terrorism in its restive Balochistan province. It also charges New Delhi of funding and using the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) or ‘Pakistan Taliban’ to conduct terror strikes in Pakistan.

A thorn in Islamabad’s side is the knowledge that the TTP has links with the Taliban and could spread mayhem across Pakistan. Again, Islamabad hopes to persuade the Taliban to reign in the terrorist group, for the blowback could be deadly. At a news conference, interior minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed claimed that the Taliban have assured Pakistan of not all­owing their soil to be used against it. Islamabad has handed the Taliban a list of its “most wanted” TTP terrorists released from Afghan prisons. The Taliban value the allies that fight alongside them; much depends on whether they are willing to assert themselves.

Pakistan is hoping that a stable Afghanistan will help further its new, ‘geo-economic’ policy, which rests on economic development, partnerships and connectivity. The big idea, backed by China, is to extend the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor to Afghanistan, build necessary infrastructure and tie it up with the Central Asian republics—a crucial link in Xi Jinping’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative. Russia, too, will benefit from such a large-scale economic plan. But for all this a quiescent Afghanistan is an imperative.

“BRI is primarily infrastructure projects funded by China to help its own strategic interests. These are not orien­ted towards helping another country’s economy,” says Pandey. “Afghanistan is a small country whose GDP stood at $4 billion before 2001. The economy is not large enough and does not produce enough goods to benefit from Chinese investment. Infrastructure projects in Afghanistan will be like those in Pakistan—white elephants providing roads for China to move its products. Strategically, for Afghanistan to be a road for China to access the West Asia would mean stability in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. With atta­cks against Chi­nese projects and engineers in Bal­o­chistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and even Karachi, why would attacks not take place in Afgha­nis­tan?” she asks.

Indeed, Beijing is in no mood to dive into Afghanistan right away. “My sense is China will be cautious and not rush into Afghanistan. It will see if Taliban can govern, before thinking of extending the BRI or trying to ext­ract minerals from there,” says ORF’s Harsh Patel. For now, China will try to make sure that the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) group is not allowed entry into its troubled, Muslim-dominated province of Xinjiang, which shares a short border with Afghanistan.

Similarly, Russia began engaging with the Taliban mainly to ward off Islamic jehadi groups extending their influence at Russia’s very doorstep through Central Asian countries like Uzbekistan. “Russia views ISIS as worse than Taliban because it will att­ack the Central Asian states and Russia. That is why Russia supports talks with Taliban,’’ says Pandey. “Russia has long been concerned about China in its backyard: Chinese investment in Central Asia is way more than that of Russia. However, for Russia China is a tactical ally to hurt the US.”

Former Indian envoy to Russia P.S. Raghavan agrees that Russia is wary of China extending its influence in Central Asia, especially in Tajikistan and Turkmenistan, which comes under its sphere of influence. “So long as the Americans were in Afghanistan, China and Russia’s interests coincided. But now the contradictions will come to the fore,’’ he explains.  

Iran, on the other hand, wants to make sure that Shia minorities of Afghanistan are protected, and it eng­aged with the Taliban to protect its own interests.

In all this, India appears to be the loser. “India should wait for the situation to stabilise,” says Raghavan. “At one point, Afghanistan will need our development assistance; we should wait patiently for that,” he adds.

The Taliban are in talks with former president Hamid Karzai and chief peace negotiator Abdullah Abdullah to hammer out the contours of an inclusive administration. Sharing the spoils of victory is not an easy task for anyone. The Taliban, too, are made up of different elements. The pragmatic and sophisticated Taliban negotiators one saw in Doha are aware of the pressures of diplomacy and wish to present a moderate face. There is also the powerful deputy leader Sirajuddin Haqqani, now in charge of the security of Kabul. Haqqani and his brother are sons of the late Jalaluddin Haqqani, a respected commander who fought the Soviets during the occupation. They, too, will extract their pound of flesh. Then there are other, little-known ent­ities within, all with varying agendas. Only a working, Taliban-dominated government in Kabul will make clear the outcome of the different demands made upon it by regional players.

(This appeared in the print edition as "First Ask The Students")