#6
The Russia Journal
November 2-8, 2001
Splintered loyalties in anti-Taliban alliance
By VLADIMIR MUKHIN
One of the results of the U.S. and British military operations in Afghanistan is a boost to the opposition Northern Alliance, which is fighting to topple the Taliban regime. The alliance is sponsored by the United States and Russia –both want to see a peaceful coalition government installed in Kabul in the future.
But it is far from certain just how realistic this is. Russia and the United States support different factions within the alliance and have different economic and geopolitical interests. For the moment, the opposition fighters and their sponsors are united more by the idea of fighting terrorism than by any lasting convergence of interests.
"Few people are aware that Russia is helping only Gen. [Mohammad] Fakhim’s troops," said Alexander Ramazanov, former editor of the Tajikistan-based Russian 201st Division’s newspaper. An ethnic Tajik, Fakhim replaced Ahmed Shah Masood as Northern Alliance commander after Masood was killed by terrorists in September.
"As for Gen. Rashid Dustum, he gets support from Uzbekistan, though I think the financing is actually coming from the United States and going through Tashkent to Dustum. It seems that he used this American money to buy arms from the very Taliban regime he’s now fighting," Ramazanov said.
Ramazanov, a Tajik speaker who has spent a lot of time in Afghanistan, said that only the ethnic Tajik population could be a strategic partner for Russia in Afghanistan. The Tajiks and related Iranian clans, who make up a third of the population, were always opposed to the Taliban, who are 90 percent Pushtun.
Ramazanov said Tajiks have more integrity and are better fighters. Dustum, on the other hand, had at one time fought Northern Alliance commander Masood and was promoting Tashkent’s interests in the region.
"There’s no ruling out that after the Taliban are beaten, Dustum might want to secede from Afghanistan," Ramazanov said. "After the withdrawal of Soviet troops, Dustum refused to obey either pro-Soviet [Mohammad] Najibullah or Mujahedeen leader [Burhanuddin] Rabbani. Now that [Uzbek] President Islam Karimov has plans to transport Uzbek hydrocarbons across Afghanistan to the Indian Ocean, it is possible Afghanistan’s Uzbek provinces could eventually try to secede.
"The disintegration of Afghanistan would create a lot of instability and could lead to a new war on the southern borders of the C.I.S."
According to Ramazanov, Gen. Fakhim’s current aim is not to take Kabul, but to establish control over the Salang pass, which joins northern Afghanistan to the central provinces. This would cut off the Taliban forces in the north from their main troops concentrated in Kabul, Kandahar and Jalalabad.
But Ramazanov said it was more likely the post-war government in Afghanistan would be dominated by Pushtuns supported by Pakistan and the United States. This explains why attempts are now being made to establish ties with anti-Taliban Pushtuns. One such figure, according to Ramazanov, is Hadji Kadyr, leader of Pushtun tribes in the provinces of Kunar, Lagman and Nangarhar.
Kadyr is said to have detachments of between 8,000-15,000 men, armored vehicles and some Scud missile systems. These detachments are to participate in taking Kabul and forming a coalition government.
Russia, meanwhile, is sending arms and ammunition to Gen. Fakhim’s troops via pontoon bridges over the Pyandzh River.
"It has become easier now to cross the Pyandzh because the Taliban have retreated westwards," said Col. Nikolai Baranov, head of the temporary Russian government press center in Tajikistan. Baranov, who grew up in Tajikistan, said he was shocked by the poverty and crime in the republic today, but said that it was "like paradise compared to Afghanistan."
Russia and Tajikistan are trying to prevent refugees coming in from Afghanistan. Baranov said that in an effort to keep people from crossing the border, Russian trucks are taking not just arms, but also food, warm clothes and tents into Afghanistan.
But Russian troops will not be joining in any of the fighting on the other side of the Pyandzh. President Vladimir Putin and defense officials have rejected any suggestion that Russian troops could join the battle against the Taliban. Tajik troops, however, are present in Afghanistan as military advisors. The Tajiks have come to teach the Afghan fighters, who use mainly guerrilla tactics, how to put tanks and armored troop carriers to more effective use.
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