Why the Victory of the Taliban in Afghanistan is a good thing:

By the start of 2002 the NATO forces in Afghanistan had won the war and controlled the country – the Taliban, who were not popular there, had crumbled almost to nothing. But rather than erect a Truth and Reconciliation Commission and attempt to implement democracy in the country - as they said they would - the NATO powers did exactly the opposite: A reign of terror was begun that was possibly worse than the Taliban one – ex-combatants, clerics and political leaders were kidnapped, externally rendered and tortured. As a result the Taliban re-acquired its popularity and a new civil war was started. The situation was similar in Iraq - the goal of the Western powers was not peace and democracy but a permanent war that would drag in Islamist fighters from elsewhere, keep western populations in a state of fear and economically benefit Western elites.

Islamic terrorism is neither morally justified nor strategically good from the Islamist point of view. But after one hundred years of interference and suppression the anger felt by the Muslims towards the West is absolutely justified and only human. Western interference started at the end of the First World War when the Middle Eastern region was divided up into the current states, directly against the wishes of its inhabitants who wanted a united Arab nation. This was firstly to facilitate the imperial dominance of the UK and France but later to ensure artificially low oil prices: Lots of competing, small producers have to sell at a lower price than one large one would. Most of these countries are not nations, they cannot continue to exist without authoritarian governments that are jealous of there own power and who will not co-operate with the others. Western sponsorship of Israel has kept these countries in an even weaker state.

Projects for Arab unity failed because of selfish dictators and the military superiority of Israel. From the 1980s Arab rulers gave up on their political ambitions after a series of failed wars. They began to co-operate with the West in order to financially benefit themselves, and join the West in exploiting their populations. It was these decisions that led to the mess with Saddam Hussein.

Up until 1979 Iran had been a staunch ally of the West. But the American sponsored Shah was a ruthless tyrant who engaged in murder, torture and kidnapping to stay in power – it was he who provoked the Islamic revolution. Having just lost in Vietnam the USA was not in a mood to just let Iran go its own way, but did not have the power to intervene itself – and it was now that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq entered the fray. Saddam did not like the Ayatollah’s radicalisation of his own Shia population and he was spoiling for a fight. The West used him as a proxy and gave him enormous wealth and a powerful army, previously he had been a rather harmless tin-pot dictator - the West had created a monster. The bloody Iran-Iraq War that lasted through most of the eighties was a failure for Saddam. Famously, he afterwards turned against the West, back to the old dream of a united Arab nation that he planned to acquire by conquest – thus provoking the First Gulf War.

On the face of it Afghanistan has little to do with the problems of Arab nationalism, but it is caught in the same cycle, nevertheless. For the last century the Middle East has been the victim of numerous imperialist interventions from outside that have mostly benefited the West. A cycle of violence has persisted, as when angry Islamists attempt to acquire their freedom or get their revenge they are faced by another intervention that makes them more suppressed and more angry. The only hope is that the West leaves them alone so that they get less angry and more moderate.

The victory of the Taliban is also a victory for Iran, for it would not have happened without that country’s backing. Iran also has a high degree of power over post-conflict Iraq and some in Syria – it is building up a regional sphere of influence. A powerful Iran makes Western interventions more difficult and less likely, and is a good thing. Iran probably has the capacity to become a nuclear power if it is again threatened by the West. The current American president seems content to let all this happen – so there is hope: After all, when Germany and Japan were forgiven for their warmongering after the Second World War and were allowed to join the Western ‘club’ they became extremely pacific and successful nations.

While the West in Afghanistan did support the education of girls, and women’s rights, it also supported a completely kleptomaniac regime and killed far more innocents than it did those who were ostensibly terrorists. Both sides in the war treated the Afghans terribly, and the war itself was a recruitment call to jihadi’s. The choice for Afghanistan was either this permanent war between thieves and tyrants or Taliban rule. Even if the Taliban were to be as tyrannous as they were in their first period of government, they will bring a peace which NATO could not.

All this is not to excuse the behaviour of the Taliban. Their treatment of women and those they consider infidel or traitors is abhorrent. But after what happened last time they are hardly going to attempt a terrorist attack on the West, and it’s hardly like a western style neo-liberal regime would be good for the country – it would not end extremism. Saudi Arabia shows that the West will support extremist tyrants if they are friendly extremist tyrants, and that would have been the result of winning the war. The war had already been lost for a decade, staying only prolonged the pain. There seems there is little that can be done for the people of Afghanistan – although the US and the UK could have certainly made more of an effort to get their allies out of the country and accept asylum seekers.

The West’s ‘War on Terror’ was obviously sparked by the 9/11 atrocity. But the reasons for its vast extent and longevity was to do with Western elites’ desire to suppress democracy at home by creating a climate of fear,their insatiable hunger for petro-dollars and the greed of the military-industrial complex. Due to the wars Western corporations now control a majority of the oil fields in the Gulf states. It is this venality and megalomania that causes trouble in the world and induces its victims to respond in an extreme and dangerous manner. There would have been no talk of a ‘World Caliphate’ if the neo-cons had not attempted to take over the world in the first place. Both sides in the wars were terrible, a win for either would be bad for the world and the assault should not have been attempted in the way that it was. What we need is a proper opposition at home that resists greed and violence in favour of hope and justice.

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