Apparently channeling Nikita Khrushchev, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, appearing at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, late last month, promised that “we will bury” the Islamic State’s forces within his country.
But will the Taliban bury him first? The fanatical, ultra-oppressive Islamists ruled Afghanistan until the U.S. chased them out after the 9/11 attacks, al-Qaida’s training for which took place at Afghan bases with the Taliban’s blessing. Now, however, the new Taliban leader, Mullah Akhtar Mansoor, the successor of Mullah Mohammad Omar, who died in 2013, has consolidated his power.
Plus, the outgoing commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan, Gen. John Campbell, haswarned that the U.S. must beef up its now-minimal operations in Afghanistan, both on the ground and in the air, if the Taliban are to be successfully resisted as they attempt to re-conquer the country.
And with neighboring Pakistan continuing, as always, to refuse to get tough on the Taliban, who move freely back and forth across the Afghan-Pakistan border, the planned “peace talks” between Ghani’s government and the Taliban will be a farce doomed to fail.
Afghanistan chief executive Abdullah Abdullah last week said, “If the Taliban gives up violence, severs their links with terrorist groups and wants to be part of the political environment in Afghanistan, they can do that.”
A defanged Taliban sitting civilly in a parliament? Does the Afghan government really want to bet its people’s necks – literally, considering Taliban beheadings – on such a pipedream?
Then again, what alternative do Afghans have with Obama’s America forsaking them? The two monsters the Afghan people now face – the Taliban and the Islamic State, who may even bewilling to work together despite theological differences – are twin threats that exist today because of President Obama’s U.S. withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan.
“We will bury you” might as well have been Obama talking about what his policies are doing to Afghanistan.
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