The Taliban Are Conducting a Psychological War
    Interview of G rard Chaliand by Isabelle Tallec
    L'Express

    Thursday 05 April 2007

Kidnappings of Westerners are increasing in Afghanistan. The latest is the capture by the Taliban of two French citizens working for a humanitarian organization. What are the objectives that their captors pursue? An analysis by G rard Chaliand, specialist in armed conflicts and author of L'Am rique en guerre: Irak-Afghanistan [America at War: Iraq-Afghanistan] ( ditions du Rocher).

    Kidnappings of Westerners by the Taliban are on the rise in Afghanistan. What are the kidnappers' objectives?

    It's a psychological war. The kidnappings are certainly a means to obtaining money, but that's not the main reason. It's a psychological war. The Taliban have other sources of revenue: drug money, financial contributions from the Gulf, etc. The essential objective is the extraordinary publicity that such acts confer, all the more so as they are highly mediatized. The hostages are filmed and those videos circulate worldwide. The kidnapping of an Italian journalist, just freed and very well known in Italy, has had incomparably more impact than the latest attack committed in Kabul. The Taliban want to obtain the departure of Westerners, particularly aid workers. For that, they need to target them directly, show their ability to do damage and strike public opinion. It's the same method they use with military action: kill the British, the Americans, the Canadians, the Dutch ... all Western soldiers that are on the front line. These kidnappings are going to increase until they arouse a kind of lassitude and end up going unnoticed. But they belong to the war arsenal.

    What room for maneuver does the government enjoy to obtain the liberation of the two French people recently captured? Does it lean towards an "Italian" scenario such as allowed Daniele Mastrogiacomo's liberation and which has aroused intense controversy in Italy?

    Those who have criticized that negotiation are those who have never had to make such a decision! That's exactly what happened with the two French journalists detained in Iraq. In such an eventuality, there are two modes of operation only. Either you have a totalitarian or dictatorial state which will not budge, even if it means the hostages are executed. Or you have a democracy, and after much procrastination and discussion, one begins to negotiate, notably because such governments have to answer to public opinion. The only question is to know how long it will take. In the case of the two French aid workers, we are likely to be in for a rather long negotiation.

    Given the danger, why don't foreign forces withdraw from Afghanistan?

    Foreign forces in Afghanistan represent about 35,000 troops divided into non-combatant forces including, notably, France and Germany, and combatant forces, essentially, the United States, Britain, Canada and the Netherlands, as well as a certain number of other countries, the citizens of which do not speak English, which suggests questions about the cohesion of such troops. As for the Afghan Army, it also includes about 35,000 men, but they are endowed with derisory capabilities in terms of weapons, materials and logistics. These troops are incapable of holding their own against the Taliban over an area one and a half times as big as France. The Afghan police are notoriously corrupt and regularly accused of looting, rape, etc. So while everything needs to be done, the effort is clearly inadequate. With the exception of Kabul - the only place where people are somewhat safe - it is impossible to go out into the countryside without taking considerable risks. Twenty million peasants for seven thousand troops live in the virtually abandoned rural areas! Yet, should foreign forces withdraw, the regime in place is likely to collapse very rapidly. This regime is strengthened by the presence of these troops, but equally by the fact that 95% of the Afghan budget depends on foreign aid.

    Why does the Afghan regime still need support now that it's been in power since 2002?

    This regime's survival has been sacrificed to the war in Iraq, George Bush's main policy construction site. That's why only 17,000 American soldiers remain in Afghanistan, principally at the Pakistan border - that is, at the center of the framework established to capture Bin Laden. The Taliban have benefited from this vacuum; they reorganized between 2003 and 2004. Then, or earlier, they could only get 50 men "through;" today, they get 200, 300 men with motorized transport around at once. They inflict serious losses on Westerners, no longer thanks to guerilla techniques and incursions, but by "locking onto" soldiers and giving battle in combats that can last two or three days.