Afghanistan moves toward partition

WASHINGTON, Nov 01, 2001 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- Already divided between north and south, war-ravaged Afghanistan appears to be moving toward a more permanent partition.

The process of partition began long before the extremist Taliban militia was formed in 1994. According to some analysts it started with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Created as a buffer zone between British India and the former Russian empire, Afghanistan survived the departure of the British from the subcontinent in 1947 because the fear of Soviet communism kept its various factions together.

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 and its disgraceful retreat 10 years later, removed the Russian fear. And the subsequent collapse of the Soviet empire in 1991, made Afghanistan's northern border with Central Asian even more benign for those who lived around it.

Ethnic minorities of northern Afghanistan, like Tajiks and Uzbeks, apparently had no reason to fear fellow Tajiks and Uzbeks living across the border.

Relieved of the fear of the Russian bear, they now started to challenge the arrangement they had within Afghanistan. Until the Soviet invasion, the majority Pashtun ethnic group enjoyed an unquestionable superiority over other ethnic groups. Their king was the king of Afghanistan and his Durrani Pashtun tribe was the royal tribe.

The arrangement continued more or less unchanged even when ex-King Zahir Shah's cousin toppled him in 1973. Mohammed Dawood became the country's president after removing Zahir Shah and continued the Pashtun control over government.

But things began to change after the Soviet invasion when urbanized and better-educated Tajiks were given better positions. Since the Pashtuns strongly opposed the communist government, other ethnic minorities like Uzbeks, and Hazaras were also taken into the government.

The Pashtuns, however, sought to regain their superiority when the Mujahedin forced the Russians to withdraw and soon after the Afghan communist government also collapsed.

However -- unlike the Pashtuns -- the Uzbeks, Tajiks and Hazaras had their forces in the Afghan capital Kabul and were not willing to surrender it to the Pashtun.

And that's how the current civil war started. Under the Mujahedin, Afghanistan degenerated into dozens of fiefdoms controlled by various tribal, ethnic and religious chieftains. A person traveling from the southern city of Kandahar to Kabul had to pay 10 times as much as his or her original fare as "protection money" to more than a dozen warlords controlling the highway. Even U.N. food convoys had to pay them to protect their trucks from being hijacked.

When the Taliban formed in 1994, they were able to restore peace in the areas under their control and did away with these warlords. This was good news for ordinary Afghans who were willing to pay any price for peace, even if it meant accepting an extremist religious militia they would have otherwise rejected. This is why the Taliban were able to capture almost 90 percent of Afghanistan in less than two years.

Since the Taliban militia is predominantly Pashtun, their emergence isolated ethnic minorities who began retreating to their pockets in the north.

The situation led to a de facto partition of Afghanistan into Pashtun south and non-Pashtun north until 1998 when the Taliban captured Mazar-i-Sharif and several other northern cities and extended their rule to the north as well.

However, their rule did not go beyond the cities as the opposition Northern Alliance, an umbrella organization of mainly non-Pashtun minorities, controlled the rural areas and the valleys.

The situation has begun to change after Oct. 7 when the United States launched airstrikes on Taliban targets after the extremist Islamic militia refused to hand over Saudi fugitive Osama bin Laden.

Hiding in Afghanistan since 1996, bin Laden is the prime suspect in the Sept. 11 terror attacks on New York and Washington that killed more than 5,000.

U.S. warplanes have already destroyed Taliban military installations and are now targeting their frontline positions around Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif. The United States is also providing weapons to the Northern Alliance and is encouraging it to capture the two cities. The alliance is also receiving weapons and financial support from Russia, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, India and Iran.

So far the alliance has not had much success against the Taliban but its allies are urging it to continue attacking Mazar-i-Sharif and Kabul.

But military strategists doubt its capability of going beyond the two cities and capturing the Pashtun heartlands in the south the Taliban get most of their support from.

Since bin Laden and his al Qaida terrorist network also operates from the south, helping the Northern Alliance capture Kabul does not allow Washington to achieve its objective -- destroying terrorist bases.

That's why, some alliance leaders complain, the United States is not doing as much as it should to help them capture Kabul.

However, military strategists say that with the help of the United States, Russia, India and other allies, the Northern Alliance will sooner or later be able to capture Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif.

Should that happen, it would practically divide Afghanistan into two separate zones with little communication between each other. Neither is capable of capturing each other's territory, meaning this division would be deeper than the one that followed the Taliban advance into Kabul in 1994.

According to Afghan analysts, even this divide will not bring peace to Afghanistan, as Pashtuns would never accept the Northern Alliance's control over Kabul. Those living around the Afghan capital will retreat to the villages and mountains around the city and will launch a guerrilla war against the new rulers.

Thus, according to these analysts, Afghanistan will soon be divided into two de facto states hostile to each other, plunging Afghans deeper into poverty, bloodshed and civil strife.

Partition will not satisfy one of the primary US objectives of this war, i.e. the construction of Unocal's oil pipeline through Afghanistan. Thus, partition is inadequate.

Why not? If the partition helps to achieve stability, it is the proper solution

Without subduing the whole country, both north and south, no pipeline can be built all the way through Afghanistan from the north to the south.

Ever heard of 'divide and conquer'? ;-)

I still can't get over that the Northern Alliance pays new recruits a nickel a day. They'd be better off a part of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.

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