Taliban ‘reluctant to publicly break with al Qaeda,’ Inspector General reports

[Valin]

FDD's Long War Journal

Thomas Joscelyn

May 21, 2020

On May 19, the Lead Inspector General (IG) for Operation Freedom’s Sentinel released its quarterly report. The assessment covers recent events in the Afghan War, including the Feb. 29 withdrawal agreement between the U.S. and Taliban. Several parts of the report are summarized below.

The Taliban’s leaders are “reluctant to publicly break with al Qaeda.”

State Department officials, including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Special Representative Zalmay Khalilzad, have endorsed the Taliban’s supposed counterterrorism assurances as part of the withdrawal accord. To date, however, there is no public indication of a “break” between the Taliban and al-Qaeda.

The State Department told the IG that “implementation of the U.S.-Taliban agreement will require extensive long-term monitoring to ensure Taliban
compliance as the group’s leadership has been reluctant to publicly break with al Qaeda.”

Left unsaid is how the Taliban could privately break with al Qaeda, without it becoming public. Al Qaeda’s men would surely complain if its longtime blood brothers in the Taliban suddenly turned on them. There would be some outward indication of a break. There are at least several hundred al Qaeda fighters embedded within the Taliban-led insurgency, according to a United Nations monitoring team. Other al Qaeda-affiliated groups, including the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP), are fighting to resurrect the Taliban’s Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan as well.

The State Department’s assessment points to fundamental questions: If the Taliban isn’t willing to “publicly break” with al-Qaeda, then why should Americans believe any of the group’s counterterrorism assurances? And if there is nothing to the Taliban-al Qaeda relationship, as some insist, then why wouldn’t the Taliban issue a formal renunciation of al Qaeda as part of a deal with the U.S.?

The Taliban’s “reluctance” in this regard is telling.

(Snip)

[Valin]

Taliban again denies Al Qaeda is in Afghanistan

Bill Roggio

July 7, 2020

In an effort to keep up the facade of a ‘peace’ deal with the U.S. government, the Taliban has yet again denied that Al Qaeda has a presence in Afghanistan. This time, the group refuted a Department of Defense report that Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) cooperates with the Taliban by claiming AQIS isn’t inside the country.

The Pentagon report, Enhancing Security and Stability In Afghanistan June 2020, included canned language about Al Qaeda that mirrors previous reports. The Pentagon minimized Al Qaeda’s threat to U.S. personnel in Afghanistan, while the ties between the Taliban and Al Qaeda were downplayed. The report claimed that AQIS only “supports and works with low-level Taliban members.”

(Snip)

The Pentagon’s claim that only low level Taliban commanders work with AQIS is false. This was proven when the U.S. military killed Asim Umar in an airstrike in the Taliban stronghold of Musa Qala in Helmand province, Afghanistan on Sept. 23, 2019. Umar was killed alongside the Taliban’s military commander for Musa Qala, as well as Umar’s courier to Al Qaeda emir Ayman al Zawahiri.

The U.S. Department of Defense suppressed a press release that would have announced the death of Asim Umar, the emir of Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent, because it “would complicate future negotiations with the Taliban,” military officials have told FDD’s Long War Journal.

Additionally, the U.S. military believes that Zawahiri is based in eastern Afghanistan. General Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., the commander of U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said in mid-June that Zawahiri is based there. Zawahiri could not shelter in Afghanistan without the support of the Taliban and its senior leaders.

(Snip)

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Mar 24 2020