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Afghanistan – This Is The End …
This was fast. The Taliban have as of now 18 of 34 province capitals (province) under there control.
- August 6 – Zaranji (Nimruz)
- August 7 – Sheberghan (Jowzjan)
- August 8 – Kunduz (Kunduz)
- August 8 – Sar-e Pol (Sar-e Pol)
- August 8 – Talquan (Takhar)
- August 9 – Aybak (Samangan)
- August 10 – Farah (Farah)
- August 10 – Pul-i Khumri (Baghlan)
- August 11 – Faizabad (Badakhshan)
- August 12 – Ghazni (Ghazni)
- August 12 – Kandahar (Kandahar)
- August 12 – Herat (Herat)
- August 12 – Qala-e-Naw (Badghis)
- August 13 – Lashkar Gah (Helmand)
- August 13 – Tirin kot (Uruzgan)
- August 13 – Chaghcharan (Ghor)
- August 13 – Pul-e Alim (Logar)
- August 13 – Qalat (Zabul)
bigger
Only three of the bigger cities, Kabul, Jalalabad and Mazar-i-Sharif, are not yet in Taliban hands.
Jalalabad and the eastern provinces near the border to Pakistan are Taliban heartland. They will fall automatically. Mazar-i-Sharif, home of the brutal warlord 'General' Dostum, may decide to fight to the end. The fate of Kabul is still open.
The other still yellow provinces will likely change hands with little or no fighting.
Paktﻯawal @Paktyaw4l – 9:06 UTC · Aug 13, 2021
My province has just announced they are surrendering to the Taliban without a fight, Gardez city will be spared from fighting. Scholars and tribal elders are telling government forces that the government is no more, no more fighting.
The U.S. is sending 3,000 soldiers to Kabul to secure the evacuation of its embassy. 650 soldiers are already there. A reserve of 5,000 is kept on bases near the Persian Gulf. Britain will send 600 soldiers. The U.S. will have to evacuate at least 4,000 'embassy' staff of which 1,400 are 'diplomats'.
The AP summarizes the situation:
The onslaught represents a stunning collapse of Afghan forces after the United States spent nearly two decades and $830 billion trying to establish a functioning state after toppling the Taliban in the wake of the September 11 attacks. The advancing Taliban ride on American-made Humvees and carry M-16s pilfered from Afghan forces.
Afghan security forces and the government have not responded to repeated questions from journalists, instead issuing video communiques that downplay the Taliban advance.
Bill Roggio, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said the Afghan army has rotted from within due to corruption and mismanagement, leaving troops in the field poorly equipped and with little motivation to fight. The Taliban, meanwhile, have spent a decade taking control of large swaths of the countryside, positioning themselves to rapidly seize key infrastructure and urban areas once President Joe Biden announced the U.S. withdrawal.
The difficulty of moving troops out to the provinces means the government is likely to focus all its efforts on defending the capital.
There is fear of a battle for Kabul but I find it unlikely that the Afghan army will take a stand. Who or what are the Afghan soldiers supposed to fight for? Its units are likely to negotiate a peaceful change of command as they have done elsewhere. They will then be told to go home. There may be some bodyguards of this or that warlord or politician who will try to protect their compounds. If they fight they will have little chance to survive.
President Ashraf Ghani and other politicians will soon retreat to their villas in Dubai. In a week or two the whole of Afghanistan may well be, for the first time ever, under total control of the Islamic Emirate.
Our politicians have lied to us over 'bringing democracy' to Afghanistan. Corruption, from Washington DC through Kabul down into the smallest army units in Afghanistan, had long destroyed all hope for better results.
The incompetent military leaders have disregarded their duty when they declared again and again that they have turned the corner of the fight. The intelligence people have never understood Afghanistan. How else could they have misjudged the speed of the current outcome?
All this was well known to anyone who read the reports by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction. But lots of weapons were sold and lots of contractors made abstruse profits for projects that were never done. The war was a self licking ice cream cone.
It is good that this scam is now finally ending. The Afghan people will be mostly happy about it. Corruption will end. No more bribes will have to be paid.
The country will continue to be poor but much safer.
Good to see this Af update from Bernhard!
I think the basic equation that has been formulated in previous analyses here, as well as by Pepe, Alex Mercouris and others is that there is a ‘Taliban-plus’ regional powers roadmap that appears well coordinated—and leaves no room for any future US influence.
We are now seeing that that unfold! In fact it looks like a well-oiled machine!
There are several key dimensions to this. First is the internal dynamics of the Taliban, which seems to have coopted a lot, if not the vast majority, of the previously existing power centers—such as those non-Pashtun areas that were long under the sway of various warlords.
The Taliban seems to have created a Big Tent, under which the various different ethnics have all congregated with a common purpose. This by itself is a hugely transformational development, that seems to have happened over a period of years.
But the wider world’s first inkling of this was just weeks ago, when the Talib started their offensive by basically waltzing into the northern Tajik areas, and in fact warmly welcomed. This was surprising to everyone, and our host immediately jumped on that as a significant signpost.
Bhadrakumar, in his latest piece also does a good job breaking down this intra-Afghan dynamic: Taliban Neutralizes the Afghan warlords
So everybody that counts for anything is on board the Taliban bandwagon. Yes, that is a big surprise that no one really saw coming. Many were expecting an inter-ethnic civil war. That intra-Af peacemaking appears to have been long consolidated by the collective Taliban.
The other dimension is with the major regional powers, which is Russia, China and Pakistan. Here too we see everybody on the same page. It’s as if they have a plan—which of course they do. Here the former Soviet ‘stans are also on the same page. This too is a relief and something of a surprise.
The overwhelming impression is that EVERYBODY—the Taliban, the Pashtuns, the Tajiks and other ethnics within Af, the ‘stans, Pakistan, Russia, China…they all have one overarching goal: get the US the hell out of there and make sure they can never darken your doorway again!
The US had different ideas, of course. They were going to continue with some kind of ‘hybrid’ war like in Syria, where they could do just enough damage to keep things from settling down.
Even Bhadrakumar for a while was taken in by this noise coming out of the US—at one point trumpeting that the US had pulled a rabbit out of the hat at the last minute [something to do with Uzbekistan and some Quad 2 etc]. What utter fantasy that turned out to be [just go back a few weeks on Bhadra’s blog, lol]!
Well, the old warhorse has quickly come to his senses now, as we have seen these US Hail Marys turn into the soap bubbles we always knew them to be, lol!
The Russians are in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan with very big exercises and military hardware, including strategic Tupolev Tu22M3 supersonic bombers! There aren’t going to be any US bases anywhere near Afghanistan, from which to carry out ‘hybrid warfare.’
What there will be is what we have seen unfolding. A quick and mostly painless transition to a Taliban-led government.
It will be recognized by the major players in the region, including Pakistan, which will then deny overfly rights to the US. Even the ‘Biden’ team must surely realize by now that there is only one door open for them—and it has the big red letters, EXIT.
So how did all of this come about, so quietly and surprisingly—and catch us all unawares?
Well, we can only judge by what we have seen lately. These pictures tell a lot. A few weeks ago, Taliban welcomed in Moscow by Lavrov.A few weeks later in Tianjin. ‘Where have you been, buddy’? says China FM Wang Yi to Taliban leader! ‘I’ve been expecting you!’
Have the Russian, Chinese and Pakistani diplomats been very busy ‘under the table’ with their Taliban ‘partners’? What about the intel boys and gals? How long has this been going on?
Interesting. Very very interesting!
And just to finish up this rather long, and probably tedious to some comment…Let’s recall just WHY the US went into Afghanistan in the first place in 2001. It had nothing to do with any fantastic story about ‘9/11’, which only purpose was to shock and awe the credulous American public into acquiescing into a decades-long ‘war on of terror.’
No, the whole idea was to move into the post-Soviet space in central Asia, using Afghanistan as a springboard. The central Asian ‘stans were to become US satrapies, like Lithuania and Poland.
But this has failed, big time. I will cut off here and let Alex M take it from here. Video: Russia Tightens Grip on Central Asia as US Regional Influences Collapses
Btw, Alex points, in his introductory comments, to the analyses on this space as a jumping off point. Worth watching!
Posted by: Gordog | Aug 13 2021 18:18 utc | 32
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