ISLAMABAD: It’s still a military-first approach in Afghanistan if the strategy review announced on Thursday by the Obama administration is anything to go by.

“Al Qaeda’s eventual strategic defeat will be most effectively achieved through the denial of sanctuaries in the region and the elimination of the group’s remaining leadership cadre,” the summary reads in part.

But here in Pakistan the security establishment has been advocating a very different approach: a political strategy based on the Afghan Taliban renouncing Al Qaeda and ensuring that Afghan territory not be used for attacks against the West.

Could such a strategy succeed?

In a series of conversations with Dawn, officials, diplomats and security analysts appeared split about the possibility of such a strategy succeeding, though they unanimously suggested that even were it succeeded, the Al Qaeda threat, and more dangerously the threat Al Qaeda affiliates pose inside Pakistan, would remain potent.

Ahmed Rashid is one of the analysts more upbeat about the possibility of a split between the Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda. “The Taliban have put peace feelers out since 2008, it can happen. But the kind of categorical statement necessary from Mullah Omar will only come if the Americans speak directly to him.”

Rashid added the main problems standing in the way of some kind of a deal with Mullah Omar were the American strategy, focussed as it is on military aims, and the Pakistan Army. “There is huge Taliban anger against Pakistan. Pakistan wants to dictate terms of any agreement, ensuring that its concerns regarding India, the consulates, etc, are met. But why must peace in Afghanistan have anything to do with India?”

Hasan Khan, director of Khyber News TV and a long-time observer of the Taliban, also believes the appetite to fight a war with no end is waning among the Afghan Taliban. “There is a generation gap among the leaders now. The ones who ruled and fought in the 90s and the early 2000s have a certain view, but the younger generation is tired of this endless war.”

“Among the Pakhtun population generally and the Taliban too there is what we would call thakawat . They are tired. When are we going to fight until, they are wondering.”

Yet, Khan was not optimistic about the possibility of a split between the Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda in the near term: “Al Qaeda provides financial support. The Taliban may want to (split), but Al Qaeda would clearly not at the moment.”

Khan went on to point that out that even if an agreement were negotiated, the Taliban would likely demand a major slice of the Afghan government, an awkward compromise for the Karzai-led government and the Americans.

Nationalist vs internationalist

Much of the argument for the separation of the Afghan Taliban from Al Qaeda appears to be based on an explanation of the Taliban as a ‘nationalist’ movement, an insurgency rooted in Pakhtun nationalist sentiment that has been roused by the foreign presence on Afghan soil.

Al Qaeda, with its ‘internationalist’ and vehemently anti-West agenda, is believed to be inimical to the Pakhtun nationalist agenda, hence the prospect of cleaving apart the two given the right incentives.However, American officials and analysts in particular remain sceptical.

Adm Mike Mullen, in Islamabad last week on his 21st trip to the country, told a small group of media representatives that while he would like to see a split take place “I don’t it (happening) right now. The Haqqanis and Al Qaeda are very, very tight right now.”

In fact, the Pakistani security establishment’s proposed strategy is being viewed with suspicion by some analysts. According to Dan Markey, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, “The connections between AQ and some Pakistan-based elements of the Taliban, especially Haqqani, have gotten stronger over the years, not weaker. I think that the desire to separate these groups might be laudable but that it can also become a convenient excuse for inaction against groups, like Haqqani.”

No ‘one’ Afghan Taliban

A major difficulty in pinning down the probability of a split between the Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda is that there is no monolith ‘Afghan Taliban’ as sometimes described in the media.

“Down in the south, where Mullah Omar and his group are active, there’s no Al Qaeda. Only the Haqqani Network is the link,” said Zahid Hussain, a veteran reporter and author of a new book on militancy, The Scorpion’s Tail.

But Hussain argued that even though Mullah Omar and the Al Qaeda leadership have never quite got along, Mullah Omar would never publicly renounce Al Qaeda.

“It would have to be some back-channel understanding, he can’t do it publicly, that’s just not have Afghanistan works,” Hussain said, before adding, “Nothing will move right now on either side (Taliban or American). It will all depend on what happens going forward.”

Meanwhile, Amir Rana, director the Pak Institute for Peace Studies, was sceptical of the possibility of the Haqqani network breaking from Al Qaeda: “It will be very difficult for them to detach themselves. First, the Al Qaeda connection is a bargaining tool for the Haqqanis. Second, it will be really difficult to turn their back on AQ because of local pressure in the area. Alliances aren’t so easy to break for local reasons often.”

A threat morphed

Yet, even if the Pak Army’s preferred political strategy for dealing with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan were to prevail, no one believes it would spell the end of the Al Qaeda threat in the region. The Al Qaeda problem, all analysts agreed, has shifted to inside Pakistans borders.

A western diplomat had this to offer on the Al Qaeda threat:

“I know the Deep State is pushing the AQ out of Afghanistan and renunciation of AQ mantra as part of a future solution for Afghanistan, whereby TB rule over part of the country is somehow made more palatable to Western actors, but I think this is really a red herring.”

“The worries I have seen expressed relate to new organisations that have sprung up in the tribal areas, attracting all the talent from AQ, attracting a lot of funding from the Gulf, sending people back and forth between Europe, the Middle East — via the Southern route, Iran or the Northern route, Central Asia — and the tribal areas.”

“These organisations are often co-located, or almost, with AQ, and share AQ’s global anti-Western agenda. They are not particularly concerned with developments in Afghanistan or Pakistan.”

Bill Roggio, editor of the Long War Journal, a website which tracks militancy in the region, said, “AQ is a far bigger problem in Pakistan. I’d also argue that the problem goes far deeper than North Waziristan, the FATA, or even KP.”

“So, a split between the Afghan Taliban and AQ, if it could be pulled off, would have a marginal impact on the overarching goal of defeating al Qaeda in the region, as the Pakistan problem would still remain.”

Another diplomat claimed, “Except for (Pakistans), everyone’s intelligence is the same. There are all sorts of quasi-Al Qaeda groups running around the country. They are inspired by AQ and have a loose connection to similar funding sources.”

But one veteran analyst had an even grimmer outlook: “Pakistans biggest challenge is not as much from Al Qaeda, whose leadership is in disarray and probably on the run, but from ‘Al-Qaedaism’.”

The analyst explained that almost all the Pakistani sectarian, Kashmiri and other jihadi groups have gone beyond their initial ‘narrow’ agendas and that their “new pan-Islamist philosophy ranges from hitting Indians, Shias, Ahmedis, Iranians, Americans, Pakistani security officials and Afghans.”

The analyst added: “Different groups may have different list of priorities, but the goal is the same. From their standpoint all these people are anti-Islam, infidels or heretics and so deserve to die. That’s Al-Qaedaism. That’s the real problem. Can the Pakistan or American strategy deal with that?”