Leaving Afghanistan
A New Peace or Ticking Bomb?
by Shane Satterley
The international community, including Australia, is preparing to withdraw military forces from Afghanistan by September 11th, how will this effect international security? Taliban insurgents have already taken back key districts in the region leading intelligence analysts to be very concerned that the insurgency could have complete control over the state within 6 months. Are the calls for concern merely a symptom of the American military industrial complex? Surely less war and foreign troops on Muslim lands (an important jihadist recruitment tool) is better for international peace and security?
Whilst these are valid points unfortunately there are many reasons to be concerned. Firstly, if we think back to 2011 and the withdrawal of American/Coalition forces from Iraq which allowed al-Qaeda Iraq (AQI) to evolve into the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), we immediately notice that pulling out security forces has had some devasting consequences for, in this case, the local Iraqi community and the nations around the world that were confronted with ISIS terrorist attacks.
But of course, Iraq is not Afghanistan, the Taliban have always had a more nationalistic theme to their insurgency rather than the overt internationalism of ISIS, or the Taliban’s house guests al-Qaeda. This does leave room for the possibility that the Taliban may negotiate more peaceful agreements with the Afghan government moving forward. The problem, however, lies with the underlying ideology of the Taliban which agrees with much of al-Qaeda and broader jihadist ideology.
A central part of the modern jihadist ideology is that the presence of foreign troops on Muslim lands is not the primary concern even whilst it is an oft-cited grievance. This was made explicit by ISIS in their online magazine Dabiq, which stated: “What’s important to understand here is that although some might argue that your foreign policies are the extent of what drives our hatred, this particular reason for hating you is secondary. The fact is, even if you were to stop bombing us, imprisoning us, torturing us, vilifying us, and usurping our lands, we would continue to hate you because our primary reason for hating you will not cease to exist until you embrace Islam”. The best data we have on beliefs within Afghanistan highlight 99 percent agreement that sharia should be the law of the land (highest in the world) and 39 percent agreement that attacks against civilians in defence of Islam can be often or sometimes justified (second highest in the world behind Palestine). Thus, we see the enormity of the issue within the Graveyard of Empires.
Does it matter that the Taliban and local Afghans share this ideology? Well firstly, from a liberal human rights perspective, it matters that one percent do not want to live under sharia, and that the minority Shia Muslims are at the mercy of the Sunni Taliban, they both should be the locus of our moral concern even whilst recognising there might not be much we can do about it. But furthermore, the main problem is that jihadist groups appear set to continue to find a home in Afghanistan which was the main reason for the invasion in the first place. The power vacuum that ISIS filled in Iraq after American withdrawal, however, is unlikely to be mirrored in Afghanistan largely due to the strength of the Taliban, hardly a positive but it is something. If the Afghan government could not take control of the country with the full support of the international community it is unlikely any other insurgent group will topple the Taliban. Thus, the Taliban, with militant ideological support from a significant minority of local Afghans looks set to be in power for the foreseeable future.
Moving forward however, we should not be under the illusion that simply withdrawing troops will stop terrorism or extremist Muslim hate towards, the West and non-Muslims, we know this is not the case. During the Bosnian war when the West did not intervene to stop the ethnic cleansing of the local Muslims, the Islamist-jihadist recruitment narrative was; “see the West does not care about you (Muslims), they won’t even come help”, this of course was followed eventually by the United States entering the war and through its intervention brokering a peace agreement. The extremist ideology is steadfast regardless of what the international community does in relation to the peace and stability of failed, failing, or authoritarian states throughout the world.
There is some room for optimism throughout the broader Middle East North Africa (MENA) region though, given that trust in Islamist parties has been falling along with religiosity in general. MENA Arabs describing themselves as “not religious” is up to 13 percent from 8 percent in 2013 and mosque attendance has also seen a dramatic drop. Whilst these data did not include Afghanistan or Pakistan, they did include key countries of influential Islamist ideologues such as Egypt and Algeria. The hope is that this trend in the MENA region can be exported to the greater Middle East countries of Pakistan and critically Afghanistan. Counter insurgency expert David Kilcullen called AQI (ISIS) “jihad, version 2.0”, unless these more optimistic trends spread, there is little reason to think 3.0 is not around the corner.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
SHANE SATTERLEY
Shane is a graduate of Macquarie and Griffith University who is interested in terrorism, international security and humanitarian related issues.
Shane has a Bachelor of Arts in Security, Terrorism, and Counter Terrorism studies and Masters of Policing, Intelligence and Counter Terrorism as well as a Graduate Diploma in Criminological Research Studies.
Shane is currently pursuing a PhD at Griffith University looking at global counter-radicalisation and deradicalisation policies.
