25 August 2021
What the entire spectrum of Western media is agog with is what they ride high on- humanitarian crises, that has been set upon by the current situation in Afghanistan. The early reports of executions, arrests, public defacing using ink, flogging etc that are now coming to the fore are one part of this narrative. Equally less highlighted by the same spectrum of media, which however manages to surface, is how Afghan civil society staged protest marches over their flag, how women protested for their continued rights under the Taliban and how the Taliban were firing into the air, and using threats to quell such protests, even as they offered amnesty and sought officials at various levels to return to work.
Right now, the entire focus is around Kabul airport, a few kilometres square, where British SAS and American marines are staging operations to rescue visa holders and listed Afghans prioritised for evacuation from Kabul, one that after the initial flux of the situation around 15-16 August, has now settled into order. An order that the Taliban naturally are incensed with and now the insurgents are seeking assurances from the Western powers that they would leave sooner than later, allowing them to seize control of Afghanistan’s last remaining airfield.
Militarily, the Afghans are in an inexplicable bind, a situation largely of both Western and their trusted Afghan locals making! A Taliban that is numerically far inferior, even equipped with bare assault weapons and radios, managed to largely seize control with minimal or no blood shed. Rumours that several members including the brother of President Ghani who resigned and fled, have joined the Taliban, suggest that mostly, post American withdrawal, provincial areas just accepted the Taliban as the new fait accompli. Amongst the officials, many have crossed over to the new Taliban on ground, allowing them to simply superimpose themselves over the existing matrix that has held power in Afghanistan for last two decades under American tutelage.
What is apparent and evident, is the failure of multilateralism on Afghanistan, despite the so called ‘global war on terror’ which was the cover with which the Taliban were evicted from office post 9/11. In effect, when Indian media is making a pitch about their PM’s address upon taking over as President of the UNSC, underlining India’s forever ambition to be permanent member of that body, what is not being stated is how ineffective or inchoate the premier security organisation per the UN Charter is today! Today, sanctions on North Korea, Iran or even against certain composites of China over ‘Uighur genocide’ are all orchestrations not emanating from the UN, but from US and her allies, which is far removed from the involvement of the UN at the peak of the Cold War. The disregard for the UN in Pentagon over the war on terror is in contrast to the Korean War, which shows how even military generalists and specialists think of coalitions are being cumbersome and weaknesses, this despite the fact that on ground more than 3 dozen countries were part of a coalition as an International Security Assistance Forces, which after the Bonn agreement and being anointed as a NATO mission, under the NATO charter whereby if one member is attacked then all are obliged to defend, the UNSC resolution 1386 was passed as an after thought! Those who deployed never wore the Blue Berets, were not the UNPKF.So should India pursue UN and membership of bodies with any vigour going forward?
The second aspect that is clear from Afghanistan is how China has reacted to the scenario. It has sought guarantees from the Taliban, from Pakistan, and from the UNSC deliberations on the subject last week, for protection of Chinese assets. It has also sought guarantee against use of Afghan soil for any insurgent or terror attacks in former East Turkestan, now Xinjiang Uighur! So China is far from being a global power, as she has not deployed any troops on ground in Kabul or in the provinces where she won mining leases or was building infrastructure, to ensure the protection of Chinese investments and interests in Afghanistan, placing her on similar level as her Western neighbour India. In fact, while EU sanctions are active against China over Uighur, EU MEPs have visited Kashmir, India’s Islamic majority province, which has been subjected to both internal and external origin turmoil and terror for decades, and over which India has been attempting to establish a new franchise by legislative status alteration ( JKRA 2019) on 5 August 2019. Culturally the Chinese have alienated not just the frontier folk on the AfPak border, but also along the Iran-Pak border in ethnic Baloch areas including a recent suicide bomber attack in Gwadar. So as a corollary, we can ask, just what is the threat level or strategic stake in Western Theatre that would draw out the PLA and her sister military concerns to commit themselves? After all, China’s massive military spending and reorganisation is to offer capabilities and options, is it not? Was the US decision to withdraw finally, an attempt to see if China could be tempted to step in to what the West ignorantly describes as the ‘Graveyard of Empires’. ( Indian Empires such as Kushan, Gupta, Maurya of recorded history, the brilliant reign of Lalitaditya as described in Rajatarangini, the late medieval Maratha and Sikh Empires attest to a diagonally opposite view as far as this region goes!)
The third important is what I call the ‘soft power factor’. Exactly what traction does the death of a football talent, or rescue of a child have in western democracies? Exactly what is the compelling gender sensitivity and equality argument outside the immediacy of Western Political Spheres? As many would argue, Occidental view on Women and Children itself, underwent transformation in the late 80s, with its first clear victory over the cause of moratorium and ban of Land Mines. The second is the Global War on Hunger. However, at the heart of gender equality, is how women and children are treated during conflict. There has been no progress, whether it is ISIS or now Taliban, in this field. No progress in how ‘political rape’ is handled surprisingly it was a controversy even in Australia, while remaining a routine feature for much of South Asia and South East Asia, where otherwise countries have good Human Development Indices. The US is yet to get over the controversy surrounding the present SCOTUS Justice Brett Kavanaugh, so strategists must proceed with caution when they assume that gender or child protection issues will play any role in strategic calculus of hard nosed Deep State votaries! What however could offer scope, is larger cultural and ethnic commons, even though we see little evidence of Islamic solidarity over Uighur, or the refugee crises of Syrian, Rohingya, and now Afghan origins in the Islamic world.
Fourth important lesson for strategic thinkers and analysts is how Western official view can transform, overnight, from one where it discounted deeply the possibility of Taliban take over, betting on forces that were largely trained by them, to the new position of accepting the Taliban as a ‘reality’ especially in how the CDS of UK has put it. So priorities vary from capital to capital, most importantly what is good for Trans Atlantic Ties is not good for Indo Pacific Ties. So how this contradictory world view will be straddled by countries like China and India, going forward, to weigh in with a more Asiatic point of view upon the global strategic community, is where the flux of the next two decades in strategic thought will emerge. Briefly, will India play a deft tilt with US over China in SCS region, while mollycoddling the Chinese over AfPak security concerns? How will China react to the new reality in her Western Theatre, will she soften toward India and create an interface whereby India can claim she is not in BRI and still be a vital segment within it? How the two Asian giants react to the changed scenarios in our global commons is crucial. This much is clear, the strategic initiative of the West is not longer a given. While the West has correctly called this #ClimateOfStrategicUncertainty, the new players emerging from this Pandora go far beyond the pandemic’s reset of global supply chains!
indiarubberman.com 