[R-G] Taliban welcome back an old friend

Thu Apr 3 10:14:48 MDT 2008

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JD04Df02.html

Taliban welcome back an old friend
By Syed Saleem Shahzad

KARACHI - Like a voice from the grave, legendary Afghan mujahideen  
leader Jalaluddin Haqqani has emerged from years of silence to boldly  
launch the Taliban-led spring offensive in Afghanistan, at the same  
time burying any doubts of a split between his coalition of resistance  
groups and Mullah Omar's Taliban.

In a video message released last week and which is only now coming  
into wider circulation, Haqqani, speaking in his trademark low-pitched  
voice and with his hair dyed red with henna, called on the people of  
Afghanistan "to stand up against the US-led forces in Afghanistan and  
drive them out".

The release of the message by Haqqani, who has a bounty on his

head as one of the US's most-wanted men, coincides with an important  
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) meeting in Bucharest,  
Romania, this weekend at which the divided alliance will try to hammer  
out a more coherent strategy in the war in Afghanistan which many  
analysts believe it is losing.

As Haqqani speaks on the video, he is accompanied by a background song  
which pledges his allegiance to Mullah Omar, laying to rest any doubts  
that he has set himself up as a rival to the mainstream Taliban.

Along with his son Sirajuddin, Jalaluddin Haqqani has built up a well- 
organized group, known as the Haqqani Network, with roots in  
Pakistan's tribal areas, that, now firmly allied with Mullah Omar,  
will pose a dangerous challenge to the coalition forces in Afghanistan.

Haqqani soundly dismissed any notion - as touted by senior NATO  
officials - that the Taliban were weakened and might forego their  
spring offensive. "All 37 allies [in NATO] will be humiliated and  
driven out of Afghanistan - jihad is compulsory and will continue  
until the end of time; we are without resources, but we have the  
support of God."

Haqqani said the Taliban and their allies in Afghanistan had come up  
with new plans to fight against NATO, but these did not have any room  
for reconciliation. "We are geared for war," Haqqani stated.

"[President George W] Bush and his allies have decided to kill us or  
arrest us - they consider us as weak and think of themselves as all  
powerful. They think we have no place left in the world to survive -  
they think we are destined either to die or to be captured ... they  
think they are wealthy nations, with their money and with half of the  
world behind them.

"They think they can enslave poor Afghans - bomb us with their planes  
and gunship helicopters - they think they have everything and we are  
voiceless - the media are with them and they belittle our resistance.  
We kill 80 and they report two or one. I promise the Afghan nation  
that soon we will be victorious," said Haqqani.

The long speech by the Pashtun leader, who made his name fighting  
against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s and remains the most- 
respected tribal figure in southeastern Afghanistan, is the most  
sophisticated yet of the Taliban's presentations to Pashtun people.

Copies of Haqqani's speech have spread all over eastern Afghanistan  
and are available in various formats, including on cassette tape and  
through cell phone downloads. After being silent for so long, and  
having been reported dead on numerous occasions, the impact of people  
listening to Haqqani is immense and will undoubtedly work as a  
galvanizing force among Pashtuns.

This especially as NATO has in recent months worked hard to portray  
the Taliban as a spent force consisting of a bunch of naive young lads  
with no credible leader left.

"They projected the rumor that Jalaluddin Haqqani had died in Dubai  
[in the United Arab Emirates]. I am neither a shopkeeper nor a trader  
that I would travel to Dubai. Neither am I a politician who roams all  
around the world ... the Americans thought that with their developed  
technology they could plant the news of my death in the media. But now  
the media are realizing their lies to demoralize the mujahideen,"  
Haqqani said.

A graphic part of Haqqani's video shows a suicide operation carried  
out by a Turk-German named Cuneyt Ciftci, also known as Saad Abu  
Furkan. He is seen in the video blowing himself up in a delivery truck  
near a US base in the Sabari district of Khost province in Afghanistan  
on March 3. According to Western press reports, two soldiers with the  
NATO-led International Security Assistance Force and two Afghan  
workers were killed and six others wounded. But the video claims the  
killing of 63 people.

The Taliban's new battle
The inclusion in the video of this suicide attack - one of dozens that  
has taken place in the country in recent years - is important as it  
shows an unprecedented level of planning and organization not normally  
associated with the Taliban.

Footage shows a professionally drawn map, like an architect's, of a  
compound of the Sabari district headquarters. There is detail of the  
boundary walls, the protective inner walls, entry points, rooms,  
backyard and front portions of the newly built structure. Clearly the  
Taliban had contacts among the laborers or contractors. There are  
pictures of Taliban guerrillas sitting around the map discussing their  
plan to launch the suicide bomber in an explosive-laden vehicle.

This is a far cry from usual grainy Afghan videos of ambushes on  
military convoys in the mountains. Haqqani's video is reminiscent of  
those made by the Iraqi resistance in 2004-05, when operations were  
meticulously planned by former officers of Saddam Hussein's army and  
executed with precision.

In the many years since being ousted in 2001, the Taliban have had  
numerous ups and downs, from the successful spring offensive of 2006  
to the failed mass uprising of 2007. Now, the Taliban have adopted a  
policy of preserving their strength by only hitting specific targets,  
rather than waste their resources in multiple direct confrontations  
with NATO forces.

The Taliban have also opened up a new front based in Khyber Agency in  
Pakistan just across the border from Afghanistan's Nangarhar province,  
as NATO has beefed up its presence in the traditional Taliban  
strongholds of Paktia, Paktika, Khost and Kunar provinces.

Last week, NATO announced the opening of an intelligence center near  
the Torkham border post, at the crossroad of Khyber Agency and  
Nangarhar province. But it was not able to thwart the biggest-ever  
guerrilla operation against a US base in the province a few days  
later. More than 200 Taliban participated in an overnight hit-and-run  
operation. Taliban sources claimed the killing of 70 US soldiers, but  
there was no confirmation of that figure from NATO or any other  
independent source.

According to the video, the Taliban will use as much foreign expertise  
as possible, as well as tapping into tribal elders and their  
supporters. This means that mainstream Taliban commanders like Mullah  
Beradar from southwestern Afghanistan and commanders who are allied  
with the Taliban but who keep their own identities, like Anwarul Haq  
Mujahahid from Nangarhar and Uzbek and Arab commanders, will join  
hands for a coherent overall strategy. This of course includes Haqqani  
and his considerable following.

A relatively new string in the Taliban's bow is the reliance on  
thousands of Pakistani and other jihadis put out of "work" since the  
struggle in Kashmir de-escalated. They are well trained, and as they  
did in Indian-administered Kashmir and other parts of India, they can  
be expected to target key infrastructure and high-profile targets,  
such as government buildings.

This year's suicide attack by the Haqqani Network on the Serina Hotel  
in Kabul, in which several people, including foreigners, were killed,  
and the attack in Khost on March 3 shown in the video, indicate one  
key direction in which the Taliban-led insurgency is headed.

Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief. He  
can be reached at saleem_shahzad2002 at yahoo.com