The assumption that the West could fight the terror group Isis-K with a policy of appeasement towards the Taliban is naive.
The two groups are enemies, but they are fighting for the same cause: the establishment of an Islamist hegemony.
The West is at war for world order.
All signs indicate that the West is in the process of establishing a policy of appeasement towards the Taliban. He is under the illusion that the Taliban can be used as allies against the terrorist group Isis-K.
Shortly after the Isis-K attack at Kabul airport, the leading international terrorism expert Peter Neumann appeared on CNN. When asked whether the West could ally itself with the Taliban against Isis-K, he replied that he had recently ruled out such consideration as “madness”. After what happened, however, not anymore. Both the Taliban and the hostile terrorist group Isis-K represent the ideology of Islamism.
The Pakistani reporter Ahmed Rashid, who knows Afghanistan from the inside like no other, compares the Taliban with the Khmer Rouge, the Maoist nationalist guerrilla movement in Cambodia, which ruled the country from 1975 to 1979 with totalitarianism and with the greatest brutality. The Taliban have a new agenda for Islamic radicalism across the region. The region that Ahmed Rashid writes about is called Central Asia.
The modern state failed in Islamic civilization
The competition of the Taliban, i.e. the Islamist movement Isis-K, has this region in its name with the letter K. The letter K is short for Khorasan. Historically, Khorasan was a province of ancient Persia. In Islamic history, the Arabs used the term to denote the non-Arab part of the Islamic empire in Central Asia. The Isis-K-Islamists use this tradition to identify their field of action.
The modern secular state centered on “nation” has failed in Islamic civilization. “Nation” does not exist in Islam and, as the basis of the nation-state, is an import from Europe. There is no nation in Afghanistan either, only tribes, the largest of which is that of the Pashtuns. The Taliban represent an internationalism in their ideology of political Islam, but act as ethnic Pashtuns.
Disintegration of political order
All conflicts and wars in contemporary Afghan history have, since the fall of the monarchy in 1973, been related to the dissolution of the state order.
After 200 years of relative stability, a military coup broke out and King Zahir Shah abdicated. A republic was proclaimed. Since then, the new republican order has not worked in the existing ethno-tribal environment. This is also due to the intervention of regional and international powers (Iran, Pakistan, Soviet Union and the USA). The Taliban movement as the Khmer Rouge of Islam emerged historically in the environment described. The context of their emergence is the disintegration of the state and of political order.
The failure of the West in the 20-year war in Afghanistan has to do with the fact that western politicians are ignorant of the history of Afghanistan and the structure of its society. There was also little agreement among the Western allies about the goals of the war. A high-ranking US general stated that from the US perspective, the focus was on post-9/11 security policy, i.e. the war on terror. German allies, the general said, had a nation-building pursued strategy; they wanted to introduce democracy into the Islamic tribal society of Afghanistan. And that didn’t work out well.
Islamism is less about terror and more about political order
Political Islam claims to offer an alternative to the secular nation. This is called the Sharia State. The Taliban speak of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. It is important to understand that Islamism is not primarily about terror, but about political order. Afghanistan is just one example of this.
Although the Taliban and Isis-K are bloodily enemies, they agree on their ideology. They want to fight disbelief, “kufr”. In the ideology of Islamism, the modern order of state and world embodies the unbelief of “Western civilization” according to Westphalian principles.
The Taliban are a totalitarian movement. According to Hannah Arendt, every totalitarianism comprises the following three segments: ideology, movement and domination. Since the conquest of Kabul at the end of August 2021, the Taliban have combined all of these three characteristics. How is the ethnic nature of the Taliban as Pashtuns compatible with their global ideology of political Islam?
An irregular war
As Pashtuns, the Taliban make up around 40 percent of the Afghan population of over fifteen tribes. With Pashto they have their own language; They also have their own code called Pashtunwali, which defines the tribal customs of the Pashtuns. When the Taliban talk about Sharia, on closer inspection it turns out to be the moral code of the Pashtunwali. This is an example of how Islam and ethnicity mix.
Unlike classic jihad, which was carried out by the state, Islamist jihad is an irregular war between non-state actors, i.e. a variety of global terrorism. For Islamists, this terror is only a means to the goal of establishing an Islamic order.
The challenge is not terrorism, but the Islamist struggle against the secular order of the world. A year after 9/11, the wise article “The New World Order and the Tempo of Militant Islam” appeared in the specialist magazine “World Politics”. This challenge takes place in the first stage in the Islamist struggle against the secular nation-state. That is exactly what the Taliban did in Afghanistan.
Islamic separatism in Europe
Islamic immigrants, including refugees from Afghanistan, bring problems and conflicts from their countries of origin with them to the host country. Parallel societies can only be prevented if Islam is Europeanized. A Europeanized Islam would enable the integration of immigrants and prevent Islamist movements from mobilizing Islamic migrants for their own purposes. French President Emmanuel Macron rightly warns urgently against “Islamic separatism”. Anyone who does this quickly encounters the accusation of Islamophobia. The danger is very real. Analogous to the Turkish and Arab parallel societies, further Islamic enclaves can arise in Europe.
Fight for world order
Islamism is not only diverse but also divided. Islamist movements are often enemies with one another to the point of blood. The relationship between the Taliban and Isis-K exemplifies this. It is not politically wrong to tactically exploit internal Islamist disputes, but it is grossly wrong to believe that one can build a political ally with the Taliban through appeasement. Western politicians fall under an illusion when they believe that the Taliban could transform itself from a political enemy into a political partner after a 20-year war.
The geopolitical war of the Islamists against the West is embedded in a “geo-civil war” within Islam. Furthermore, the ideological dimension of dealing with Islamism is central. In the USA the conflict with the Islamic challenge is called the “war of ideas”. But it is even more apt to speak of an ideological conflict of civilization. This is about the world order.
Written by: Bassam Tibi, a professor emeritus for international relations at the University of Göttingen.
Image Credit: Getty
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