Taliban Takeover and International Politics

By: Jinsar Ali, Student of BSIR at Iqra University Islamabad
Sadly, since the Soviet invasion of 1979 in Afghanistan, the country has been blighted by
civil wars and political unrests, which rampaged human and material losses bluntly. The
US bestial engagement since the inception of the 21st century plunged the country into
mayhem and exacerbated the peace for a long time by snatching more than 30,000
civilian lives, more than double to it leaving Afghan soldiers dead, with the worth of two
trillion dollars approximately. “The greatest crime since World War II has been U.S.
foreign policy” said by Ramsey Clark. Since the end of the Second World War , the US
left no stone unturned to hammer out its tutelage, either through its racketeering system
or by direct force. Surprisingly, it continued to bring about its influence in Asian
continent but its foreign policy has been repudiated in every part of this region due to
cultural, religious and ideological discrepancies. Left Vietnam in the lurch, hurled Iraq
in hot water, brought about Syria in a pickle, and more recently lurched Afghanistan
nowhere, are some of its vitriolic actions in which at the end it made off with, without
carving a better tomorrow. However, its pretence of being utmost and strong adherent
to international order also unveiled when it’s leader’s tried to wash their hands by
hurling all mess on its own installed puppets in decades-long military confrontations.
The fallout of Kabul to Taliban took aback the world, that tarnished the US image and
will remain a notorious blot on its foreign policy. There could be several factors for the
US hasty withdrawal but among them two stand out; either it only wants to contain
China’s pervasive influence from the world as it explicitly started repudiating it’s
leading role, or soaring internal pressure caused to leave Afghanistan without a peaceful
reinstatement of power sharing of Taliban and government lead allies.
Importantly, Pakistan seemed to be rapturous for the Taliban especially since the PTI
came into power, leadership explicitly expressed beatific sympathy on the evacuation of
US-led NATO forces from Afghan soil. However, Islamabad will likely to expunct all
barbarities done with the country and hopes that Taliban will also not act in reprisal on
account of being a close ally of the US in War on Terror. How Kabul will react to the
ecstatic buoyancy of Islamabad is not far away but owing to the transmuted version of
Taliban they will navigate diplomatic options rather than formidable aggressiveness.
Islamabad’s optimistic approach towards the Taliban ought to obviate Indian ambition
of besmirching the country in sleaze activities by installing a pro-Pakistani regime in
Afghanistan after the expatriation of the pessimistic Ghani regime. Besides it, the
islamist adherent ideology of Taliban can help Islamabad to assuage the irredentisim of
Afghanistan over Pashtun territories by jacking up the religiosity over nationalist
identity. Moreover, China’s tantalising contrivance intends to keep the Taliban away
from obnoxious pogroms and savagery of Uighur Muslims by coming close at the
earliest to clench Taliban’s consolation. Because, the annoyance of the Taliban can halt
its economic unfolding through projects like CPEC due to Islamist based ideology. As the matter of Taliban is concerned, they are grappling economically and the world’s
second largest economy probably would be the best opportunity to recuperate from the
economic fragility and being the US competitor will ease diplomatic hurdles for them.
Iran also has revitalised its relations with the Taliban and both have been devastated by
the blistering policies of the US for a long time so this anti-americanism ideology is the
major source for maintaining amicable ties. This antipathy for America will be a
prerogative for both to winkle each other from bankruptcy. For India, the Taliban
takeover is a matter of grave concern that hangs it in balance due to a number of
reasons. Firstly, it is sceptical about reverberation of ‘Mujahidin’ in Indian held Kashmir
that would create discomfort for it by worsening the security situations. Secondly, India
has remained a preeminent state in Afghanistan that played a key role in the revival of
democracy and infrastructure building during the US-led NATO presence in the
country, so it would result in diplomatic and economic defeats for India if Talibn will
still remain on the back and call of Islamabad.
For the World has a lot to learn, especially countries those which are fastened with civil
unrests, must awake itself from the dormancy and obduracy of power, you would not
receive salvation from problems by any external entity, either they erode you or pull out
your resources and at the end you will be hurled in a bewildering crisis of civil unrests
and conflicts, the world has several prototypes of Britain and the US in this cause,
Palestine, Vietnam and Afghanistan cases have buttressed the dereliction of so-called
saviors. Unluckily, such countries had crippling internal instability which resulted in
abysmal exploitation. Currently, it’s neither going to be a plain sailing for the Taliban in
Afghanistan due to bankruptcy, the whereabouts of its foreign reservoirs are unknown,
they have dire need of administrative and policy makers, and how they cope up the
challenge of nation building and constructing consensus on power sharing will be an
acid taste for them in ensuing time. Indubitably, the Taliban has delivered a sensible
role, now it’s time for the world to alter its disposition in sobering manner and especially
its regional states must shore it up economically before time runs out and they
compelled to move towards the 1990’s sources of revenue generating then it will be very
hard to escape from the deleterious consequences of such extortionist methods for
entire region including Pakistan.
Islamabad should be prudent while carving out any move studiously regarding Afghan
matter and must keep the Taliban to stick to its updated modality and should take
assurance of ostracizing of terrorist groups in order to avoid turbulent ferocity in future.
Whereas, whether the US has learned a lesson or not, it remains elusive due to its
schizophrenic aggressiveness in its attitude and having a colossal economic and military
power. For how long, the world will bear the brunt of US obnoxious actions depends on
the efficacy of world law in bringing it to book