The NYT recently reported that the government was recently “seeking to aid the Pakistan Taliban in their fight against Pakistan’s security forces.” Isaac Chotiner sighs:
To describe the Afghan government’s initiative as insane would be generous. Yes, it is true that Afghan resentment at Pakistan is understandable and deep, and that the country’s weariness and anger about being treated in a colonial manner by its larger and nuclear-armed neighbor makes plenty of sense. But the idea that this is going to help Afghanistan emerge from its decades-long troubles is far-fetched, to say the least.
For starters, Pakistan is much, much more powerful than Afghanistan, and is unlikely to take kindly to this particular proxy war. Secondly, the attempt to discriminate among different Taliban factions is destined for disaster. Indeed, this is precisely what has motivated Pakistani policy in Afghanistan for the past decade, with horrific results…for Pakistan. There may be distinctions to be made among different Taliban factions, but they are all extreme and interconnected, and nurturing some of them while opposing others has brought Pakistan to its current, blood-soaked impasse.
Meanwhile, Yochi Dreazen fears that Afghanistan’s future will look a lot like Iraq’s present:
It’s impossible to say how much of Iraq’s current carnage could have been prevented by a continued US military presence in the country, but a pair of retired officers with long experience in the country said the withdrawal of elite Special Operations Forces like the Navy SEALs and the Army’s Delta Force made it significantly harder for the Iraqis to track down and kill individual militants. The withdrawal also meant that Iraqi troops were no longer receiving video footage from U.S. drones and surveillance aircraft. Iraq recently asked the U.S. to send the drone aircraft back to the country, but the White House said no.
Karzai could get a similar cold shoulder from the administration, which has made clear that it’s running out of patience with Karzai’s dithering over a troop immunity deal. Secretary of State John Kerry spent two days in Kabul earlier this month trying to get Karzai to budge, but the Afghan leader said he opposed giving troops protecting from Afghan law and would instead refer the matter to a gathering of key Afghan tribal and religious leaders known as a Loya Jirga. The Obama administration wanted to close the Afghan deal by the end of October, a deadline which now seems impossible, and White House officials are now openly saying that they might pull all U.S. troops out of Afghanistan at the end of 2014, when most foreign troops are already set to leave the country.
The Dish 