Afghanistan (Washington Insider Magazine) -Even though the US-led coalition invasion forces led Afghanistan over 2 months ago, the Taliban has not been able to bring stability in the power vacuum since.
A group inspired by ISIL, named Islamic State-Khorasan Province or ISIS-K, look increasingly like they could be a long-term obstacle to a routine of supposed normality taking hold in Taliban-led Afghanistan. The insurgents hold strong ideological disagreements with the Taliban and so have met the new leadership with suicide bombs attacks and assaults on Taliban convoys. It has been estimated that hundreds of lives have been lost in the insurgent violence already as the ultra-hardline group tries to impede what recently seemed like an imminent consolidation of power by the Taliban.
Whilst the international community has widely criticised the Taliban’s historical mistreatment of women and the lack of promises to foster anything resembling an equal society, ISIS-K believes they are being too lenient in caving to this pressure. They also strongly oppose any semblance of diplomacy, particularly with the US, who led a twenty-year invasion that has been estimated to have resulted in up to half a million deaths and 2.2 million displaced Afghans, but also with China and Russia.
Whilst the Taliban has tasked itself with establishing an Afghan Islamic government, ISIS-K has more ambitious goals that include the imposition of an Islamic caliphate across Afghanistan, Pakistan and parts of Iran and India. They see their vision as part of a wider Islamic cause, whilst they view the Taliban as having been reduced to a less pure pursuit, nationalism.
Afghanistan’s geography coupled with ISIS-K’s tactics means eliminating their threat will be a very difficult task for the embryonic government. Enabling the state apparatus to start operating from the rubble would already have been a task believed by many to be insurmountable but this added factor means the war for Afghan’s is probably still a long way from over.
Some suspect foreign influence in galvanizing the insurgents, with the USA most infamously having a history of arming terrorists in the region. Some also suspect Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, who may be looking to gain a foothold from which they can pressure the Taliban into suppressing Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, who has been a threat to the Pakistan government for years.
