Countries like Russia, China, and Iran have long been striving for global engagement with the Taliban. Representatives of these countries emphasize the necessity of engaging with this terrorist group in every international gathering and demand the lifting of UN sanctions and the release of Afghanistan’s frozen assets by the United States. In the latest remarks, Russia’s deputy representative to the UN welcomed the organization’s decision to extend the UNAMA mission, stating, “Achieving sustainable peace in Afghanistan is impossible without a comprehensive and balanced assessment of the situation and constructive interaction with the Taliban.” According to him, there is “no alternative for engaging with the Taliban.”
While Pakistan once lobbied for the Taliban, it seems Islamabad has now felt the catastrophic consequences of full-fledged support for this terrorist group, leaving Russia, China, and Iran to take on this role. All three countries seek to normalize the current catastrophic situation in Afghanistan, with its primary terrorist group, and in some way, portray America and Western countries as the main culprits of the current crisis in Afghanistan.
There is no doubt that the United States plays a significant role in the Afghan crisis and should not be ignored. However, what is undeniable is the destructive dominance of a terrorist group over our country, which for over two years has committed such atrocities and disasters that only a true Afghan resident can fully comprehend, not the Russian, Chinese, and Iranian authorities who have always made decisions based on their own economic, political, and security interests, not the welfare and interests of the Afghan people or the countries supporting them. However, these countries will eventually realize their mistakes in dealing with the Taliban. This group will disappoint Moscow, Beijing, and Tehran just like Islamabad, as the Taliban, like Russia, China, and Iran, only consider their interests, not the interests of the Afghan people or the countries supporting them. If the Russians, Chinese, and Iranians do not understand this, they should ask the Pakistanis. Islamabad’s support for the Taliban as a proxy force has a much longer history than the support of Moscow, Beijing, and Tehran and began precisely when this group started its activities. During the twenty-year presence of the United States in Afghanistan, the Taliban also benefited from Pakistan’s unconditional support in various fields and ultimately relied on it for their power base.
However, when the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan, they pursued their path contrary to Pakistan’s expectations, and Islamabad’s efforts to control and restrain this group again have not yielded positive results so far. On the contrary, the regime in Kabul, with the support of the Pakistani-sponsored Taliban (TTP), has made Rawalpindi’s victory in the Afghan war bitter. This bitterness is so serious that Islamabad has decided not to lobby for the Taliban internationally anymore and to refrain from efforts to recognize the regime of this group officially, a move that has backfired on the Taliban in the current circumstances. Since even a single country has not recognized the regime in Kabul officially, Islamabad’s action has intensified the diplomatic isolation of this group. However, since the Taliban values its ideological beliefs more than anything else as a fanatic ideological group, it has not complied with Pakistan’s requests to join in suppressing the TTP, nor does it seem likely to do so in the future.
The Afghan Taliban and Pakistan are inseparable in terms of nationality and ideology, and for this reason, the expectation of suppressing the TTP by the Taliban is simplistic and arises from a shallow understanding of both groups. The only action that the Afghan Taliban, if compelled to take, could take is to move TTP members away from the border regions with Pakistan and relocate them to the northern, western, and central provinces of Afghanistan, which is not a permanent or guaranteed solution. TTP members can return to border areas with even stronger political status than before, or they may organize their terrorist attacks in Pakistani territory from northern, western, and central provinces. Nevertheless, the Afghan Taliban have not implemented even this plan of relocating TTP members to northern, western, and central provinces with the intensity and severity originally assumed, and it may even have been suspended.
The Taliban are loyal only to their ideology. This ideology is a combination of religion, Pashtun nationalism, criminal economy, and terrorism, which in a dialectical relationship reproduce each other. The central element of this ideology is terrorism, a tool that alone can preserve and promote other elements of this ideology. “Constructive engagement and practical action with the Taliban,” as the deputy representative of Russia to the United Nations speaks of, is an effort to preserve and strengthen terrorism. Is there any meaning other than this for cooperating with a full-fledged terrorist group? However, Russia, China, and Iran believe that by supporting the Taliban in Afghanistan, they can fight terrorism, which, in their view, is supported by the Americans.
Russian and Iranian officials have repeatedly accused Americans of supporting ISIS and believe that the Taliban is a reliable partner in the fight against this group. In other words, Russians and Iranians support a kind of terrorism against terrorism; a war that has a realist logic of defending “bad” against “worse.” In this theoretical framework, the Taliban are introduced as “bad” and ISIS as “worse.” This political realism is common and entrenched in international politics, and all governments adhere to it. However, the problem with realist tendencies is that they lack a strategic perspective and can only provide short-term solutions. The main problem not only persists but also reproduces itself as before. Suppose the Taliban, with the support of Russia, China, and Iran, could completely eradicate ISIS; but what would happen to the Taliban’s problem? This group, which was “bad” before suppressing ISIS, has now become so powerful that it is no longer bad, but the worst. Therefore, by suppressing ISIS by the Taliban, terrorism not only does not disappear but also strengthens more than ever. Russians, Chinese, and Iranians, with all their efforts for the formation of “constructive engagement and practical action with the Taliban,” are normalizing and perpetuating terrorism; terrorism that will one day haunt Moscow, Beijing, and Tehran as well.
