Since their emergence in Afghanistan nearly a quarter-century ago, the Afghan people and the world at large have been perplexed by how to respond to the ragtag Taliban militia determined to rule the country as a hard-line Islamist regime.
The Taliban failed to moderate or normalize into a postwar legitimate Afghan government. Their relations with transnational militant networks such as Al-Qaeda, Pakistan’s numerous jihadist organizations, and Central Asian militants resulted in their regime being toppled by a U.S.-led military intervention after Al-Qaeda orchestrated the 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington from its Afghanistan safe haven.
The demise of their regime in late 2001, however, didn’t end the Taliban movement. They soon re-emerged as an insurgency that sustained military operations by NATO troops for more than a decade.
Today, the Taliban control large swathes of the Afghan countryside, which they mostly overran after the departure of most NATO troops in late 2014. The insurgents, however, have failed to overrun major population centers and are nowhere close to toppling Afghanistan’s national unity government as long as Kabul receives substantial international aid and support.
The battlefield stalemate extends into the political sphere. Nearly a decade of diplomatic efforts to end the Afghan war through a negotiated solution between the Afghan government and the Taliban has yielded little. The two sides have only met once in direct talks.
The Afghan peace process is clouded by mutual suspicion, domestic political intrigue, efforts by warring parties to gain decisive battlefield advantage, and the not-so-covert efforts by Afghanistan’s neighbors to prevent a peaceful resolution.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s new administration is already grappling with one of the key questions his three predecessors have faced: What to do with the Afghan Taliban? His generals have already called for more U.S. boots on the ground in Afghanistan.
To discuss this question, RFE/RL Media Relations Manager and Gandhara Podcast host Muhammad Tahir turned to Bill Roggio and Eric Jones in Washington. Roggio is managing editor of the Long War Journal website while Eric Jones runs the Foreign Intrigue website.
Hekmatullah Azamy, a researcher at the Kabul-based Centre for Conflict and Peace Studies, shared insights about the Taliban perspective on war and peace in Afghanistan. Contributing from Prague, I argued that strengthening the Afghan state, regional cooperation, and reconciliation among all Afghans will provide the right solution for ending the Taliban insurgency.
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Gandhara Podcast: How To Deal With The Taliban In Afghanistan
The views expressed in this podcast do not necessarily reflect the views of RFE/RL.