"The Taliban have a great capacity to make their fighters obey"

Text by: Juliette Gheerbrant

According to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the United States and the Taliban are on the verge of reaching an agreement in Afghanistan. He will activate the withdrawal of American soldiers from the country, a condition posed by the insurgents to envisage direct discussions with the government of Kabul, a government contested after the last elections.

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A first step must be taken this Friday evening: the Taliban, the Afghan and American forces have agreed to respect " a week of calm " which came into force at 8:30 p.m. Paris time. Interview with Adam Baczko, CNRS researcher, CERI-Sciences Po.

RFI : While an attack by the Taliban took place last Sunday against the Afghan army in the north of the country, a first question arises : will the agreement be respected at the local level by the warlords ?

Adam Baczko: The Taliban have shown in the past a great capacity to obey their orders. We have already had cases of disobedience of Taliban fighters vis-à-vis the hierarchy, we have had in particular cases of conflicts between local commanders and hierarchy, but these conflicts so far have been very localized and the Taliban have always been very able to impose their strategy on their fighters in the different provinces of the country.

Today Mike Pompeo announces the signing of the largest withdrawal agreement, the agreement between the Taliban and the United States for February 29. The agreement provides for an inter-Afghan dialogue to begin soon after. Is it realistic ?

What the American secretary of state says is that the negotiations that will begin between the Taliban and the Kabul regime in a situation where the Taliban will have obtained what they have been asking for almost two decades: the departure of American troops . The Taliban will thus have a considerable advantage, their progress on the ground will be done with less and less American soldiers, the government of Kabul will thus have in the negotiation a very narrow margin of maneuver.

In Kabul, the political situation is tense. The government has been disputed since the presidential election last September. This risks jeopardizing the outcome of the negotiations, or even the process as a whole ?

Yes quite. As we saw in 2014 when the United States imposed the non-disclosure of the results and the appointment of Ashraf Ghani as president, we are again in a situation where the elections do not offer a result that allows legitimize the Afghan regime. The elections were fraudulent as we know, they were much more so than the authorities are willing to admit. So we are left with a double problem: the Kabul regime appears weaker than ever and on the other hand, it is difficult to know in the context of negotiations what the capacity of the Kabul regime, for its part, is to impose its decisions to the various potentates of the regime.

Does that mean that the Taliban will eventually take over ?

It is certainly not impossible. The Taliban are advancing on the ground and the only thing preventing them from taking and guarding cities is the US military. Without their presence, the Taliban would have already taken several cities and in the absence of American forces, it is not impossible that the regime will eventually collapse.

If there is an American military withdrawal and the establishment of an inter-Afghan dialogue, will peace return to the country ?

Peace is unlikely in Afghanistan because the Taliban are fighting for power. What was played out in the negotiations was American withdrawal, not peace. So, on the contrary, it would not be surprising if hostilities resumed stronger knowing that in addition there is still today the possibility of a rise in power of the Islamic State (IS) organization in the country. This rise in power has been relatively contained, but the movement nevertheless remains able to open another front against the Taliban, bring about a radicalization of the war and therefore, it is not impossible that the war will intensify rather than the peace is coming.

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