Chapter 2 continues…

They needed Afghan and Arab volunteers, and they needed the sanctuary of guerrilla training camps in Afghanistan. The ISI established clandestine training camps at Kabul, Jalalabad, Kandahar and other areas of Afghanistan that provided training to militant groups involved in the Kashmir insurgency. The US airstrikes against perceived al Qaeda camps in Khost in 1998 turned out to be the training camps for the Harkat ul-Ansar, thereby, revealing the links between Afghanistan and groups involved in the Kashmiri insurgency.

The ISI had initially depended on Hekmatyar and the Jalalabad Shura to provide protection to these camps, but eventually depended on the Taliban to provide them with protection. Pakistan’s objectives vis-à-vis Kashmir and India had also made it imperative for them to extend support and protection to the Taliban.
Despite the Taliban’s success in capturing Kandahar, the ISI was initially sceptical about their chances for further success and, thus, preferred to watch developments rather than act prematurely in giving the Taliban militar y backing.

The ISI was not unanimous over the issue of supporting the Taliban. Although the largely Pashtun officers involved in covert operations on the ground favoured greater support for the Taliban, it was other officers who were involved in longer term intelligence gathering and strategic planning, who wished to keep Pakistan’s support to the minimum so as not to worsen tensions with Iran and the Central Asian Republics. It was the former group of Pashtun officers who ultimately triumphed.

These Pashtun officers resented the apparent decline of the Afghan Pashtuns under the Rabbani-Massoud administration; non-Pashtuns (predominantly Tajiks) dominated the state bureaucracy, military and diplomatic missions, which till 1992 had been under Pashtun dominance. Moreover, the Pashtuns had lost territorial control with their rule extending over only two-fifths of the country.

The Taliban was seen as a possible option to revive Pashtun fortunes in Afghanistan. In fact, by 1995 support for the Taliban had become the main thrust driving Pakistan’s Afghan policy.

To be continued…