Why Taliban talks won't bring peace

NY Post ^ | November 8, 2010 | Amir Taheri

[neverdem]

The Afghan government and the Taliban are preparing for face-to-face talks aimed at ending a conflict that started almost a decade ago. Yet, even before the talks begin (indeed if they do begin), it's clear that neither side is prepared to make the concessions needed to end the conflict.

Afghan sources say the talks are to take place later this month in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, in the background of the annual Hajj pilgrimage, with "significant input" from the Saudis.

The Afghan delegation is to be led by former President Burhaneddin Rabbani and will include a brother of President Hamid Karzai plus Foreign Minister Abdul-Wakil Mutuwakkil, himself a former Taliban.

Rabbani is an apt choice to lead the "peace delegation": As president of Afghanistan in the 1990s, he helped boost the Taliban in order to weaken his chief Pushtun rival, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. Once the Taliban had defeated Hekmatyar (who fled to Iran), they turned their attention to Rabbani, driving him from Kabul without firing a shot.

Afghan sources say the talks are no more than a "probing exercise" and shouldn't be seen as formal negotiations. Yet the Taliban claim they won't settle for anything less than "a fundamental change of direction" for Afghanistan.

Karzai sees the talks as way to persuade America and the NATO allies that he's the man to deliver the "political solution" that is the fashionable talk in Western capitals. His camp also sees this as a good time to engage the Taliban -- because Mullah Muhammad Omar's forces have suffered a series of defeats in the last six months.

"The best time to talk to the Taliban is when they are losing," a senior Karzai adviser tells me. "When they have some momentum, they see no reason to talk."

Despite some spectacular suicide attacks (which may indicate...),

[Dilbert San Diego]

Aren’t the Taliban as much an enemy as Al Qaeda?

I remember Bush’s speech to Congress and the nation after Sept. 11th. In that speech, he said that the Taliban must turn over to us all terrorists in Afghanistan and shut down the terror training camps, or else the Taliban “would share the fate” of the terrorists.

The Taliban partially suffered the fate of terrorists in that we overthrew their government in Afghanistan. But the job isn’t finished. Can you imagine if guerilla bands of Nazis were still on the loose after Germany surrendered in World War II? Wouldn’t we still have gone after any remaining armies? So shouldn’t we still consider the Taliban an enemy, since they are still plotting our destruction????

[Karliner]

Why Taliban talks won't bring peace.

Easy answer, because they're the Tahleebahn. Until they change their ways( not we ours as CAIR and Wahabi's so wish). If they're all dead the attitude in the region will change. End of lecture.

[Secret Agent Man]

Won’t matter because we are not submitting to them and their false pagan god dreamt up in a pedophile syphillitic madman’s head.

[ckilmer]

They’re now talking about running the war until 2014. The taliban won’t be able to sustain their losses that long.

[SuziQ]

Yet the Taliban claim they won't settle for anything less than "a fundamental change of direction" for Afghanistan.

They are not interested in peace, unless that means that THEY are in charge, and everyone in Afghanistan has submitted to Allah, and them.

[william clark]

One word: taqiyya

[SunkenCiv]

The Afghan government and the Taliban are preparing for face-to-face talks aimed at ending a conflict that started almost a decade ago.

Nearly a decade, eh? Al Qaeda and the Taliban are intertwined, and the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan began while the Soviets were still there -- and the USSR folded up nearly 20 years ago. Thanks neverdem.