Experts, policy makers raise alarm bells over Taliban eyeing Pak nukes!

@prashanthamine

Mumbai: Both China and Pakistan appear to be on Cloud Nine after installing a puppet Taliban regime, which is even more factionalised now. Policy experts, security analysts and former US administration officials are raising alarm bells over the factionalised Taliban once again trying to lay its hands on Pakistani nukes!

China stares at a possible economic meltdown with rampant power cuts, exacerbated further by a massive possible meltdown of its real estate giant Evergrande. China is already getting edgy with Pakistan over terror attacks on its stalled China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) projects.

Already security analysts and policy experts are warning of the possible revival of Taliban factions like the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Islamic State of Khorasan Province (ISKP), Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda in the Indian Sub-continent (AQIS). The biggest danger posed is that these factions have craved to lay their hands on the nuclear arsenal of Pakistan!

To make matters worse both the factions subscribe to the notion of Global Jihad or Internationalisation of Jihad. In-short, they are not averse to poking their nose in Jammu and Kashmir, which is what Pakistan is wanting them to do its bidding.

Also Read: Since 2006, surveys, SIGAR & media reports all pointed towards a “Enduring US Disaster” in Afghanistan

Adding to this already smouldering cauldron is a resurgent terror outfit that was so close to laying its hand on the coveted nuclear weapon from Pakistan in 2009. A resurgent TTP poses a grave threat to not just the world at large, but also to India and Pakistan.

According to New York Times chief Washington correspondent David E Sanger who in his book “Confront and Conceal” has an interesting revelation that includes the successful attempt to stop the Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud from gaining nuclear weapons in the summer of 2009. The unsuccessful attempt of the TTP had literally scared the wits out of the Obama administration then.

That very same fear has once again been stoked by former US National Security Advisor to former US president Donald Trump, John Bolton has in a recent interview remarked that the Taliban could arm itself with up to 150 nuclear warheads after retaking Pakistan. He added that after taking control of Afghanistan, the Taliban could eye taking control of Pakistan as well.

The dangers posed by TTP, Islamic State of Khorasan Province (ISKP), Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda in the Indian Sub-continent (AQIS), reviving themselves as the US forces began their messy withdrawal from Afghanistan, was red-flagged in May 2021 itself.

Amira Jadoon, a policy expert on Afghanistan had in a May 2021 Special Report for the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) titled “The Evolution and Potential Resurgence of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan”, had pointed towards the dangers posed by these factions reviving themselves.

By 2015, a US drone campaign and Pakistani military ground operations had destroyed much of the cadre base of the TTP. But with the signing of the Doha agreement on February 29, 2020 between the Taliban and the US, it was like the US lifting its foot of its throat!

The most worrying thing for the international community is that the TTP has been in favour of alliances with like-minded factions like the Al Qaeda in the Indian Sub-continent (AQIS), ISKP and others who are not just opposed to the US, but more specifically against Pakistan military presence in the region.

Out of the lot, it is the TTP and the ISKP that are more vehemently opposed to militant factions sympathetic towards Pakistan and its military presence. On the other hand, the TTP has helped Al Qaeda in granting its militants safe heavens in the mountainous regions bordering Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Of the lot, policy experts like Amira Jadoon label the TTP as the deadliest of the militant organisations that operate from northern border regions both in Afghanistan and Pakistan. These militant outfits have found safe heavens in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) as well as provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan.

Since January 2021, more so in recent times, the TTP has once again stepped up its attacks inside Pakistan targeting not just civilians, but more importantly the Pakistani army. The TTP has carried out terror attacks outside of FATA and KP into urban areas of Quetta, Karachi and Lahore. Since early this year, the TTP has carried out 32 terror attacks inside Pakistan, mostly in North Waziristan, Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

The most audacious attacks carried out by the TTP was at the Pakistan Navy’s Mehran naval base in 2011. The TTP militants fought a 15-hour long battle which left 13 people dead and a Pakistani maritime surveillance aircraft destroyed.

According to Amira Jadoon, Pakistan has been guilty of capitulating before these terror outfits like the TTP. A case in point is the Malakand accord with the Tehrik-i-Nifaz-i-Shariat-i-Mohammadi of Sufi Mohammad wherein Pakistan agreed to implementation of the Sharia law in districts of Malakand, Swat, Shangla, Buner, Dir, Chatral and Kohistan.

Both Pakistan and China may be in glee, eager to rush into a region often described as the “Graveyard of Empires”, to tap into the potential rare earth mineral deposits of Afghanistan. Pakistan may have succeeded in ensuring that the real power lies with its chosen Haqqani Network.

The disappearance, silence or house arrest of Taliban’s second-in-command Mullah Baradar indicates that all is not well within the terror outfit. The recent terror attack by ISKP on Kabul airport on August 26, 2021 only underlines the fact that the Taliban does not have absolute control over other militant factions and that all is not well within its own ranks.

The warning signs issued by Amira Jadoon in May 2021 and more recently by former US NSA John Bolton are ominous. For China too, besides its impending economic meltdown, reigning in the various factions of Taliban may not be that easy.

The Taliban itself might want to bargain and barter Nukes either with Pakistan or China, if they both do not want any trouble in their own backyards of Balochistan or Xinjiang. Taliban factions like the TTP, ISKP and AQIS are not averse to lending their support to separatist Uyghurs in Xinjiang province.

In the Indian context the increased terrorist activities in Jammu and Kashmir, attempts by Pakistan to push through terrorists and drop arms and ammunition using Drones into border regions of Punjab in India, are ominous signs. But certainly, things are a lot different politically and militarily in India since 2014, Moreover, both China and Pakistan are facing their own internal situations that could explode in their own face sooner or later.