Posted on 09/11/2012 3:33:07 AM PDT by the scotsman
The Taliban may be prepared to renounce terrorism and sever links with al Qaeda, accept a power sharing role in a new Afghan government and even tolerate American bases in their country, according to a new report.
A panel of four experts from the Royal United Services Institute interviewed four senior figures - each one part of the "pragmatic" or "moderate" part of the Islamist movement - at a secret location in the Arabian Gulf.
The four figures, among them two former Taliban ministers, a Mujahideen commander and a well-connected negotiator, surprised the experts by insisting that they had no enmity towards the United States.
They also held out the prospect that the Taliban could even join efforts to rid Afghanistan of al Qaeda if the movement was part of a national government.
Michael Semple, one of the authors of the report who has lead negotiations with elements of the Taliban in the past, said: "This derives from the understanding that there is not going to be a military solution in Afghanistan, that the war being fought is unwinnable, and from a strong sense among some of the 40-something Taliban leadership that they dont want the country to disintegrate into civil war when foreign forces leave the country in 2014."'
(Excerpt) Read more at news.sky.com ...
There is an alternate view of what will happen after the US leaves. The taliban will be slaughtered along with wives and male children.
To attempt some reconciliation is to prevent slaughter. It makes sense for the cooler taliban heads to look forward and attempt to prevent the coming slaughter
Thought I was clear.....I loathe the sumbitches, but the Taliban did NOT attack NYC on 9/11. If they’re sick of getting their butts kicked by our military and now want to distance themselves from al Quaeda.....fine; we’ll take it. To suggest they “started this” is inaccurate. Yes, they harbored al Quaeda types and backed them, but these are largely a group of uneducated rubes. It took some (sick) smarts to pull of 9/11, not to mention serious $$$ that only al Quaeda possessed.
That of which I typed is of more than simply the outlay mentioned. It involves much more than the arabs. Think corner, and where our nation is in this the present. Are we (Americans) in the corner, or do we want them to think we are in the corner? Do they have us where they want us, or have we played 'rope-a-dope'?
US Diplomat and Pakistan expert under investigation [house raided by the FBI on October 21, 2014]
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3224414/posts
Sure, they’re “just” a large group of uneducated tribes with the full backing of Pakistan, a nuclear power, and aligned with one of the biggest drug trading networks in the world.
The State Department in effect was assisting the Taliban's inhumane blockade intended to starve out communities, which opposed their dictates. Perhaps the most glaring evidence of this administration's tacit support was the effort made during the Spring of 1998, when a visit to Afghanistan made by Mr. Inderfurth who will be with us today and the United Nations Ambassador Bill Richardson. These administration representatives convinced the anti-Taliban northern alliance not to go on the offensive against a then weakened and vulnerable Taliban. Instead they convinced the anti-Taliban leaders to accept a cease-fire that was proposed by Pakistan. This cease-fire lasted only as long as it took the Pakistanis to re-supply and reorganize the Taliban. In fact within a few months of the announcement of the U.S. backed Ulima (ph) process, the Taliban freshly supplied by the ISI from Pakistan and flush with drug money went on a major offensive and destroyed the northern alliance.
So, our administration, at a pivotal moment, interceded in a way that brought the Taliban to almost complete power in Afghanistan. This was either incompetence on the part of the State Department and US intelligence agencies, or it is indicative of a real policy, the real policy of our government to insure a Taliban victory. Can anyone believe that with a Taliban, identified by the United Nations and the DEA as one of the two largest producers of Opium in the world; that they weren't being closely monitored by our intelligence services who would have seen every move of the military buildup of the Pakistanis and when they tried to build up the forces of the Taliban...."
--- US congressman Dana Rohrabacher, 1999
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