There could soon be an Indian Taliban'

Flint

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There could soon be an Indian Taliban'

Aziz Haniffa in Washington, DC

April 15, 2009
Ahmed Rashid, one of the world's foremost experts on the Taliban [Images], has predicted that with the resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan, there could very well be an Indian Taliban in the near future.

Rashid exhorted India and Pakistan to resurrect their dialogue and cooperate in fighting terrorism and extremism together because if Pakistan fails to counter the sustained onslaught of the Taliban, New Delhi [Images] could be faced with a Taliban government as its neighbour.


"If you think infiltration into Kashmir is bad now, wait until the Taliban become your neighbour. Then you will see real infiltration not only into Kashmir, but into India proper."


Rashid, who was speaking at the Woman's National Democratic Club in Washington, DC, in a discussion and book-signing of his most recent book Descent into Chaos: US Policy and the Failure of National Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia, under the aegis of the Asia Society, said, "In 2001, we expected after the US attack (in the aftermath of 9/11) that the Taliban, Al Qaeda [Images], would be on the ropes, if not wiped out."

"Today, we have the Taliban as a role model for an entire region. We have not only the Afghan Taliban, today, we have the Pakistani Taliban, Central Asian, and very soon you may have the Indian Taliban. You may have the Taliban stretching into the Caucasus and even into the Middle East," he told the gathering.


Rashid, who first wrote the seminal book on the Taliban, reiterated that "it's become a role model for extremism, it is backed financially by Al Qaeda, and it's extremely dangerous.
It is now controlling something like a quarter of Afghanistan and large tracts of northern Pakistan and they are coming now down into Punjab and Pakistan is faced with a very, very serious threat."

The Pakistani military, he added, "unfortunately, even today, remains in a state of denial about the threat that it faces in the country. It remains in a state of denial over the Taliban who are encroaching in Pakistan with even more power and tactics. It remains in denial about the other extremist groups who've been active in other parts of Pakistan -- in the south and the center of the country. It also remains in denial of the desperate means that the military needs to be re-aligning itself on a much more modern counter-insurgency strategy that it has so far applied in its action with the Taliban."

Rashid said the situation in Pakistan "is very dire," and that currently "there is a fragmentation in the leadership. There is no demonstrated leadership, either being shown by the politicians or being shown by the army right now."

With regard to the Obama [Images] administration's new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, particularly its regional approach, the Pakistani author and journalist argued, "The problem is all of the six neighbours have bilateral problems with each other and you cannot get them to agree on stabilising Afghanistan, unless you initiate a diplomatic process to get them to talk to each other about their bilateral issues."

Rashid said it was a no-brainer that "the biggest problem here is India and Pakistan," both of whom "are unfortunately now involved in a deep rivalry in Afghanistan."

"I call Kabul the new Kashmir in a way," he said, and noted that "Pakistan believes that the Indian presence in Afghanistan is undermining the western border of Pakistan and that the Afghan government is too close to India. There is a litany of complaints here. And, this is all being affected by the Americans, by the US military and the Indian-Afghan alliance is part of a US plan to help destabilise Pakistan."

Rashid said, "This is the kind of conspiracy theory which is very prevalent in the military, the bureaucracy, in government circles, within the elite in Pakistan."

"I certainly don't agree with that and Afghanistan is today a sovereign State and it has a right to have relations with every country in the world and no other country can dictate that you can't have relations with so and so and so and so."

But, Rashid asserted, that "at the same time, the Indians need to be much more flexible than they have been."

He acknowledged that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh [Images] "has been very patient so far with the kind of strings of bomb blasts that had happened in India even before Mumbai [Images]. Mumbai was perhaps the icing on the cake and perhaps with elections looming, the Congress government couldn't really take it anymore."

"Anyway, the net result has been a total breakdown in relations, but I really think, a start should be made in trying to get India and Pakistan to discuss Afghanistan and to put an end to this covert war that both sides are mounting from Afghanistan or in Afghanistan, and the bad blood that exists between both countries and are threatened by the Taliban."

Rashid warned that if India doesn't let Pakistan "off the hook here," and doesn't help Pakistan out in this regard, India would be faced with two threats in the near future. India would be "faced with an Indian Taliban. We already have Indian Islamic extremist groups working in India, and secondly, if Pakistan slides even further, India will be sharing a border with the Taliban. You will not be sharing a border with the Pakistan state. You will be sharing a border with a Pakistan northwest frontier province that has fallen to the Taliban and even parts of Punjab fallen to the Taliban and then what are you going to do?"


"There is a real need for India to assess its national security needs and to understand that it is threatened by this," Rashid said. "It may be, for someone living in Kolkata or someone living in Madras, it may be an existential threat. But, it is very real and the kind of mayhem that was wracked in Mumbai recently is an example of what some of these groups are capable of doing."
 

Flint

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Deserves to be stickied IMO. Ahmed Rashid is indeed one of the foremost experts on the Taliban. His words should be taken seriously.
 

Blitz

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the writer may be an expert in matters of the taliban but if we take a look and try to understand the situation where the taliban has flourished they have had local support be it afganistan be it the swat valley there were a lot of people among the population who supported the taliban but in case of india i am fully sure they wont get the support that they need to thrive
look at the swat valley the local population hid them from attacks of the united states and nato forces and they mixed well with the local population there to hide their identity that wont be the case with india they will be grossly exposed.

secondly the writer fails to see the fact that the taliban flourished in afganistan because of the support of a government namely pakistan and in the NWFP they flourished because no one tried to counter them.

pakistan thought that they can use the taliban in the same way the US used similar elements against the erstwhile USSR.but they forgot that they will come back and bite their own master.

moreover the case of the taliban surviving on the afganistan and NWFP is the terrain where they can use their hide and hit tactics unlike in india .


because of all these points i say this is nothing but a START DIALOGUE SAGA that we have so often hear in the past.

let all of us remember that till now nobody has actually fought the taliban honestly the us and nato tried it but they had the backstabber pakistan as their ally so could not succeed to eliminate them if they come face to face with a real army who is willing to take them on they will be over in less than a month
 

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the writer may be an expert in matters of the taliban but if we take a look and try to understand the situation where the taliban has flourished they have had local support be it afganistan be it the swat valley there were a lot of people among the population who supported the taliban but in case of india i am fully sure they wont get the support that they need to thrive
look at the swat valley the local population hid them from attacks of the united states and nato forces and they mixed well with the local population there to hide their identity that wont be the case with india they will be grossly exposed.
Taliban are feared more than they are loved.(Machiavellian)

Talibani ideology owes allegiance to the Deobandi school of thought, a school of thought widely respected and followed by subcontinental muslims. Indian deobandi school has officially denounced Taliban and terrorism but some (dissenting) extremist preachers can certainly exist, who may align or adopt an ideology similar to Taliban. If SIMI etc can exist then why not Taliban ?

Though the mass base and power which Taliban enjoys in Af-Pak cannot possibly be replicated in India.

secondly the writer fails to see the fact that the taliban flourished in afganistan because of the support of a government namely pakistan and in the NWFP they flourished because no one tried to counter them.
Adding to your point, places where Taliban flourishes have been plagued with institutional collapse and lawlessness. India has fortunately very robust institutions and a paramilitary-army which is not squeamish when it comes to eliminating extremists. So for us this threat of Taliban can only mean a rise in incidences of terrorism and not a take over a la Af-Pak.

pakistan thought that they can use the taliban in the same way the US used similar elements against the erstwhile USSR.but they forgot that they will come back and bite their own master.
true to an extent. Taliban initially comprised of children of the poverty-ridden Afghan refugees in camps across NWFP. Pak sought to kill many birds with one stone, aka rehabilitate refugees, stabilize Afghanistan, control Afghanistan, get tons of money in the name of Islam and aid.

moreover the case of the taliban surviving on the afganistan and NWFP is the terrain where they can use their hide and hit tactics unlike in india .
Unless the opposing army is not determined terrain hardly matters. Kashmir is a very hostile terrain but terrorism there has gone down in the last 2 decades.

because of all these points i say this is nothing but a START DIALOGUE SAGA that we have so often hear in the past.

let all of us remember that till now nobody has actually fought the taliban honestly the us and nato tried it but they had the backstabber pakistan as their ally so could not succeed to eliminate them if they come face to face with a real army who is willing to take them on they will be over in less than a month
Taliban is an ideology, you fight ideology with ideology.
 

thakur_ritesh

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i want to ask a few questions, is the threat of extremism new to india, has the ia, the paramilitary forces and the state police not handled the same extremism with determination and have they not been successful in tackling this threat coming from pakistan for long. lets open our eyes and stop dreaming for a moment and lets for a moment start believing in our armed forces for a moment, why react as if our armed forces are not capable of dealing with any such terrorism even if it was to emerge off the slumbers.


india today has some 60% people who have had formal education (2001 census), the economic liberalisation that started way back in 1991 initially saw oozing of benefits for the rich, the upper middle class and then for the middle class, but off late those benefits earned are being transferred to the rural population that may be by way of 100 days employment for every individual who can be employed per year, or by providing day food to kids who flock to school whose parents might not provide the same, or a loan waiver for the countries farmers and there are hundreds and thousands of such examples, and for terrorism to find roots and for it to prop up there has to be a situation where people of the country feel alienated, which might have been the case previously but successive governments have tried their best to address all such problems.


do people think such attempts would have not been made by the isi or their stooges the taliban/al qaeda previously, and if that is the thought then it is too naive a thought. yes no denying the fact that there are certain corners in the country where there will be sure shot sympathy for the taliban and their school of thought but it will be good to remember that in the early part of independence most muslims always thought of pakistan the land where they should have always been but today most feel that they themselves, their parents and their grand parents took the right decision of staying in india which is all a sign of how things are changing for the good. yes a part of the community feels alienated but their concerns are being addressed to. focus is on to impart quality of education at the level of a madrasa certainly different to the stuff that gets taught in pakistan. is terrorism our state policy like that of pakistan, have we ever used terrorists as force multipliers in any war. very clearly the issues are there but the government is not running away from tackling them on the contrary the community elders are being engaged to address the issues where they might be, it is a slow process but changes are happening which certainly are for the good.


lets start believing in ourselves, our institutions, our own people rather than on an expert called ahmed rashid and if we cant have faith in our own and in our own selves then i am sorry that defeatist psyche will never ever see the light of the day even when that light emerges over head. lets not always view things from a negative point of view, let us learn to appreciate the good happening around us, make that good an example of the society and build our country around all such good and for that to happen we first need to recognise the good and not turn a blind eye the moment we see it.
 

Flint

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Thakur, I'm not worried about the Talibanization of Indians as much as the thought of having the Taliban as our neighbour. That's by far the bigger threat.
 

SATISH

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Talibanisation of India in my opinion is a far distant dream. We have lived in a free society...I can go call upon someone and question him. We have had the taste of freedom of speech and action. We are intoxicated with freedom. We cannot be deprived of it. There will be revolutions against Taliban by the Muslims themselves. And there is no place which is fully dominated by fanatics in India.
 

nitesh

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huh what a threat mongering who cares what is going on in the neighbor hood there foundation is based on hating India so what difference this new name brings in. Nothing but a submission by neighbors that they are not capable of defending themselves
 

Soham

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Talibani ideology owes allegiance to the Deobandi school of thought, a school of thought widely respected and followed by subcontinental muslims. Indian deobandi school has officially denounced Taliban and terrorism but some (dissenting) extremist preachers can certainly exist, who may align or adopt an ideology similar to Taliban. If SIMI etc can exist then why not Taliban ?
Actually thats a misconception. Taliban is an innovative form of sharia combining Pashtun tribal codes or Pashtunwali, with radical Deobandi interpretations and principles similar of Wahhabism. The only area where they deviate from Wahhabi ideology is that they did not destroy the graves of pirs and emphasized dreams as a means of revelation.
 

Soham

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Thakur, I'm not worried about the Talibanization of Indians as much as the thought of having the Taliban as our neighbour. That's by far the bigger threat.
Maybe not. The Taliban is an unprofessional army which fights with fanatical bravery without caring for their lives. This might not always work well for them.
If, let's assume, Pakistan turns into "Talibanistan", US and China will immediately block weapon supplies, sanctions will be imposed and their only means of survival would be opium and Saudi funds.
They will be terribly crippled by a non-functioning air-force and navy.

Taliban despises covert attacks, they believe in massed attacks in a semi-professional manner. And their beliefs will soon turn into a suicide for them.
 

SATISH

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I would rather not underestimate my enemy.
 

Soham

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I'm not underestimating them.
I'm not overestimating them either.

They have some clear weaknesses, which can be exploited to our advantage.
They have some strengths, which can be neutralized without much mdification.
 

Singh

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Actually thats a misconception. Taliban is an innovative form of sharia combining Pashtun tribal codes or Pashtunwali,with radical Deobandi interpretationsand principles similar of Wahhabism.The only area where they deviate from Wahhabi ideology is that they did not destroy the graves of pirs and emphasized dreams as a means of revelation.
Umm NO ?

According to the Taliban's version of the Deobandi school of jurisprudence, the adoption of local practices led to dilution of the laws laid down by the Prophet. ......

The Taliban subscribes to a sect of Deobandi school which broke away after Kamal Ataturk propounded the concept of secular Islam by abolishing the Friday namaz in Turkey. Called the Jamiat-e- Ulema-e-Islam (JUI), it feels the incorporation of local traditions and national identity is dangerous because it dilutes Islam. ....

The Taliban's efforts received a shot in the arm due to their ideological affinity with another radical sect, the Wahabis, the dominant sect in Saudi Arabia. While there are many differences between the Wahabis (Ahle-Hadiz) and the JUI's version of the Deobandi school of jurisprudence, they are both averse to praying at Dargahs and to observing Muharram


http://www.hindu.com/2000/01/01/stories/05011349.htm

For a clearer understanding of differences between Salafi/Wahabi and Deobandi please contact Musalman sahab.
 

Soham

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Umm NO ?

According to the Taliban's version of the Deobandi school of jurisprudence, the adoption of local practices led to dilution of the laws laid down by the Prophet. ......

The Taliban subscribes to a sect of Deobandi school which broke away after Kamal Ataturk propounded the concept of secular Islam by abolishing the Friday namaz in Turkey. Called the Jamiat-e- Ulema-e-Islam (JUI), it feels the incorporation of local traditions and national identity is dangerous because it dilutes Islam. ....

The Taliban's efforts received a shot in the arm due to their ideological affinity with another radical sect, the Wahabis, the dominant sect in Saudi Arabia. While there are many differences between the Wahabis (Ahle-Hadiz) and the JUI's version of the Deobandi school of jurisprudence, they are both averse to praying at Dargahs and to observing Muharram


http://www.hindu.com/2000/01/01/stories/05011349.htm
Mate,
I said they are not pure Deobandis, they have carved out a new set of regulations from Pashtu, Deobandi and Wahhabism.
 

Yusuf

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How about saying that the Taliban is following the "Taliban" school of thought interpreting their own version of The Quran?
 

Singh

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Mate,
I said they are not pure Deobandis, they have carved out a new set of regulations from Pashtu, Deobandi and Wahhabism.
How about saying that the Taliban is following the "Taliban" school of thought interpreting their own version of The Quran?
1. Taliban are largely Pashtun, Pashtun have historically followed Pashtunwali.
The Afghan (Pashtun) refugees growing up in the refugee camps in NWFP, Pakistan were born in filth, lived in poverty, and are those who became Talibs (besides other) they have not been exposed to mainstream Pashtun society, but were instead sent by parents barely able to afford food to Madrasas(run mostly by JuI, funded by KSA mostly) for shelter, education and food.
Now, Pashtunwali is in some cases antithetical to Islam and in some case it is in accordance with Islam. Where it is in accordance with Islam, where it is not, it is most likely not followed by Taliban, for eg in its treatment of women, children and ancient monuments etc.

getting to Wahhabism and Deobandi
 

Daredevil

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Rashid warned that if India doesn't let Pakistan "off the hook here," and doesn't help Pakistan out in this regard, India would be faced with two threats in the near future. India would be "faced with an Indian Taliban. We already have Indian Islamic extremist groups working in India, and secondly, if Pakistan slides even further, India will be sharing a border with the Taliban. You will not be sharing a border with the Pakistan state. You will be sharing a border with a Pakistan northwest frontier province that has fallen to the Taliban and even parts of Punjab fallen to the Taliban and then what are you going to do?"
So, how does Mr. Ahmed Rashid proposes that India should fight along with Pakistan against Taliban. Should we send our Army to Afghanistan and Pakistan to fight Taliban or should we give the Kashmir to Pakistan on a silver platter?. Which one is it?.

What does he mean by 'India should let Pakistan off the hook"?.When did India put Pakistan on the hook?. Perhaps he meant giving away kashmir.

Mr. Rashid conveniently forgets that Indian Islamic extremism is propped up by none other than Pakistan's ISI, by indoctrination of misguided Indian youths, training in bomb-making and funding the extremism.

I have been following Ahmed Rashid's articles for a quite a while now, his theme is always to try to link Taliban extremism in Pakistan to Kashmir. He thinks that giving away Kashmir will solve all the problems pertaining to Taliban extremism in Pakistan. What a fallacious idea?. Not going to happen Mr. Rashid.
 

Flint

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Daredevil, you are nitpicking on the peripherals in order to avoid the main issue.

I'll take your word for it that Mr. Rashid has proposed that India give away Kashmir to solve the Taliban problem, because I have never come across such a quote from him. But even if he does suggest that, give him some leeway for being a Pakistani and try to understand where he is coming from.
This is the man who first interviewed Osama Bin Laden. He is a vocal critic of the Pakistani government and its policies and he's been writing all these years warning of exactly what is happening in Pakistan today.
 

Daredevil

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Daredevil, you are nitpicking on the peripherals in order to avoid the main issue.

I'll take your word for it that Mr. Rashid has proposed that India give away Kashmir to solve the Taliban problem, because I have never come across such a quote from him. But even if he does suggest that, give him some leeway for being a Pakistani and try to understand where he is coming from.
This is the man who first interviewed Osama Bin Laden. He is a vocal critic of the Pakistani government and its policies and he's been writing all these years warning of exactly what is happening in Pakistan today.
I'm not nit-picking Flint. Tell me what does he want from India?. He wants India to solve Kashmir issue, so that Pakistan gives up policy of extremism as a state tool and focus on weeding out Taliban. He argues that, if Kashmir problem is not solved, Pakistan will not give up extremism to meet its strategic goal of occupying Kashmir and end up talibanising Pakistan.

Tell me what do you think he is trying to say?.
 

jackprince

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Talibanisation of India in my opinion is a far distant dream.
Not distant, Impossible.

For so-called Talibanization, the 'Indian Talibans' would need the support of the majority people of a region - whether out of love, faith or fear, which they can't get anywhere in India except for may be in Kashmir, which is too unlikely. If Taliban's tried to influence and spread does Mr. Rashid think the majority people who aren't muslim will stand back? Even i'm sure over 90% of the indian muslim would not accept Talibans or any other radical islamic extremist groups. I don't know much about Mr. Rashid, but he seems to be a perfect spokesman of Pakistan - trying to put pressure on India, without giving any hint that Pakistan anything productive against the trouble.

He says Pakistan isn't comfortable with Indian 'noncombatant' presence in Afghanistan! Why? Then how come they be comfortable enough to collaborate against Talibans? How can we trust those two-timing back-stabbing scoundrels, who perpetuated Kargil war?!!!!! He speaks about the conspiracy theory of destabilizing pakistan?!!! For over a year Pakistan hadn't been stable anyway, without any input from India.

Another Pakistani BS.
 

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