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STRATEGIC TRENDS 2014 Key Developments in Global Affairs Center for Security Studies STRATEGIC TRENDS 2014 Key Developments in Global Affairs Editors: Oliver Thränert, Martin Zapfe Series Editor: Andreas Wenger Authors: Lisa Watanabe, Jonas Grätz, Michael Haas, Prem Mahadevan, Martin Zapfe CSS ETH Zurich STRATEGIC TRENDS 2014 is also electronically available at: www.css.ethz.ch/strategictrends Editors STRATEGIC TRENDS 2014: Oliver Thränert, Martin Zapfe Series Editor STRATEGIC TRENDS: Andreas Wenger Contact: Center for Security Studies ETH Zurich Haldeneggsteig 4, IFW CH-8092 Zurich Switzerland This publication covers events up to 28 February 2014. © 2014, Center for Security Studies, ETH Zurich All images © by Reuters (except p. 65, © by US Navy / MC Scott Barnes) ISSN 1664-0667 ISBN 978-3-905696-43-1 CHAPTER 3 The ‘talibanization’ of insurgency Prem Mahadevan As Western troops continue their withdrawal from Afghanistan, the stage is being set for the emulation of Taliban insurgent tactics elsewhere. Having tested the limits of Western military power, radical Islamists are encour- aged by the proposition that persistent subversion, coupled with steady attrition through direct and indirect combat – the latter primarily involv- ing improvised explosive devices – shall exhaust the West into strategic retreat. Although no insurgent group has the capacity to prevent the entry of Western forces into a combat theatre, denying such forces the tactical ability to operate freely shall grow easier. A member of the US Army’s 52nd Ordnance Group prepares confiscated improvised explosive devices (IEDs) for detonation near Combat Outpost Hutal in Maiwand District, Kandahar Province, Afghanistan, 21 January 2013 49 STRATEGIC TRENDS 2014 The withdrawal of International insurgency since 2001 has proven Security Assistance Force (ISAF) that even a non-state actor can pur- troops from Afghanistan will sue the modest goal of area denial have important implications for against vastly superior conventional the military credibility of the armed forces, via asymmetric war- North Atlantic Treaty Organi- fare. Even if Western troops enter an zation, as well as the European insurgency-affected region, they can Union’s political authority in the be deprived of the freedom to operate developing world. As far as radical at will within it. Islamists are concerned, Western pow- er is diminishing. For them and their Although the Taliban model of insur- supporters, proof of this decline can gency has yet to be exactly replicated already be seen in Iraq, where more in other contexts, some aspects can than a decade of counterinsurgency already be noticed elsewhere. Suicide has brought no lasting result. Rather, bombings in Mali, ‘swarming’ assaults Al-Qaida-linked militants have seized in Iraq and the tactical innovativeness control of some of Iraq’s most impor- of jihadist groups in Syria all point to tant cities, such as Fallujah and Rama- battlefield lessons being transmitted di, which were bitterly fought over by along a knowledge chain originating US troops less than a decade ago. in Afghanistan. The operators of this chain might be Al-Qaida or its affili- As Michael Haas notes in the next ates, or even the Taliban themselves. chapter, the development of anti-ac- For over the last decade, the insur- cess/area denial doctrines has reached gents in Afghanistan have developed an unprecedented level of intensity in a distinctly pan-Islamist worldview, many non-Western countries. These partly out of a desire to mobilize re- states are trying to ensure that the sources from the wider Arab and Is- world’s preeminent military power, lamic community against Western the United States, cannot interfere troops in Afghanistan. with their regional agendas. The same applies to non-state actors, which are This chapter will highlight the main now likely to learn from the Afghani- characteristics of ‘talibanized’ insur- stan example. The Taliban could not gency. In so doing, it will provide a prevent US forces from entering Af- checklist of tactics and techniques ghanistan in 2001; they had (and still that Western militaries will have to have) no capability for implementing watch for in the future, when operat- an anti-access strategy. However, their ing overseas against Islamist guerrillas. 50 The ‘Talibaniza Tion’ of i nsurgency Beginning with the strategic develop- retained a surprising degree of stra- ments that allowed the Taliban to re- tegic coherence. Therein lies the first cover from the overthrow of their re- clue to its success: the existence of a gime in 2001, the chapter will examine layered organization that functions as the innovative methods by which the a loose network while preserving the Taliban have enhanced their military, unity of purpose that comes with hi- psychological and economic clout and erarchical structures. Any insurgent illustrate how other groups are copying leader who was co-opted by the West these methods. Finally, the chapter will or the Afghan government was swiftly offer some reflections on what theISAF labelled a renegade and deprived of withdrawal might signify for Western the credibility that would have cre- military interventions elsewhere. ated a split in the insurgent move- ment. Throughout, the power centre Strategic development of of the insurgency lay in its leadership’s talibanization continuing close ties with Pakistani The Taliban insurgency has been a intelligence, and the strategic advice tactically decentralized affair that has it seems to have received therefrom. 51 STRATEGIC TRENDS 2014 Western analysts have noted that the During this period, other Taliban Taliban have long had an innate un- forces kept Afghan and ISAF troops derstanding of guerrilla tactics at the preoccupied along the international field level, based on the accumulated boundary with low-level irritants wisdom of three decades of civil war such as rocket fire and shallow pene- in Afghanistan. However, in strategic tration raids. Distracted from the Af- terms the insurgency of 2002 – 14 was ghan interior, and subjected to a pol- markedly different from any kind of icy downgrade back home caused by campaign that the Taliban had ever preoccupation with the war in Iraq, waged before. This has given rise to ISAF units were unable to organize speculation that after 2001 the Tali- for counterinsurgency. ban leadership was following a blue- print for Maoist-style protracted war- Airpower was a powerful tool for both fare, provided by extraneous actors. Its sides, but in very different ways.ISAF own leadership showed no particular used it to great effect while carrying gift of generalship either before or out area dominance missions and de- during the 2001 invasion by US forc- capitation strikes. The Taliban used it es, thus raising the question of how to showcase the ‘foreignness’ of their Taliban leaders could have had the vi- enemy and discredit the country’s pro- sion to organize a long-term resistance Western leadership for not resisting movement. the use of vastly superior force against Afghan civilians. Thus, the operation- Calibrating operations with subversion al contribution of airpower in sup- Evidence of such a capacity for long- port of ISAF offensives was balanced term planning has increasingly come out by the psychological boost that it to light. It is known that the Taliban gave the insurgent recruiting appara- spent the years 2002 – 05 infiltrating tus, largely because the insurgents did large numbers of cadres into Afghani- not have any ability to compete with stan, from safe havens in Pakistan. this instrument. Since they could not These cadres, some crossing the inter- be blamed for civilian lives lost in air- national boundary in groups of 100 or strikes, the Taliban used airpower (or more, avoided carrying out the large- rather, the lack of it) to justify their scale attacks which were well within own resort to terrorist tactics. their means. Instead, they focused on quietly subverting the populations of Fusing terrorism and insurgency remote rural areas, which could serve Talibanized insurgency combines tac- as bases for the coming insurgency. tics of terrorism and guerrilla warfare. 52 The ‘Talibaniza Tion’ of i nsurgency Thus, insurgents in Afghanistan have Keeping an eye on the prospect of developed an operational model that eventually returning to power, the is resistant to ‘conventional’ counter- Taliban have avoided resorting to insurgent measures such as winning methods which would lose them hearts and minds among local popu- popular support within their already lations. Unless first provided with se- finite, Pashtun-centric power base. curity, few rural communities will be Thus, they have not carried out fre- willing to cooperate against the insur- quent rocket attacks on population gents. Yet blanket security coverage centres, as the Afghan mujahideen cannot be extended throughout the did during the 1980s and the subse- countryside, due to the need to pro- quent civil war. In areas where they tect infrastructural targets, particularly have a strong support infrastructure, in a rugged landscape where connec- they have provided advance warning tivity is poor. to the population before launching attacks on ISAF troops. This allows Counterinsurgent commanders are the locals to escape military retribu- then caught up in the dilemma of how tion and bolsters the Taliban’s image best to use their limited forces effi- as a people-friendly force. However, ciently. Both politically and doctrinal- in areas where the ISAF presence is ly, Western militaries are better suited stronger and popular support for the to short-duration counterterrorism insurgency is not as pronounced, the missions than long-duration counter- insurgents have been happy to carry insurgency, with its attendant task of out provocative attacks. They hope state-building. Force structures differ that by doing so, they can engineer dramatically between the two types a security backlash that would fall of mission. Counterterrorism requires upon the locals, who would then ei- the use of stand-off firing platforms ther support the insurgency or at least and lightly equipped helicopter-mo- suffer for not having done so.
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