Taliban 2.0 is smarter, deceptive and has a better media strategy but it remains as brutal, cynical and regressive as before

After capturing Kabul, the Taliban declared an “amnesty” for all government officials and surrendering soldiers. They vowed not to take revenge. “We have no personal rancour. If the people find someone responsible for crimes in the past we will judge him according to Islamic law,” said one militia commander. “Life appeared to have rapidly returned to normal elsewhere in the capital,” noted media reports. Sounds familiar? This was in September 1996. Having taken over Kabul, the Taliban had strung ousted former president Mohammad Najibullah from a lamppost after stuffing  severed genitals into his mouth and announced the formation of an Islamic emirate. History tends to move in circles while we, perennially short of memory, commit the same mistakes over and over again. It has been surreal to note the willing suspension of collective disbelief with which the world has greeted the latest iteration of the Taliban. As if the UN-designated terror group that carried out public executions in football stadiums, treated enemies with violent reprisals, married minor girls and promulgated a 13th century legal, political and judicial system that militates against all vestiges of human progress have miraculously morphed into a kinder, gentler, updated version. It only took one press conference for the world to declare that this is ‘Taliban 2.0’. One Indian columnist went so far as to proclaim that the Taliban have become “an incredibly diverse movement that made inroads into all communities and ethnic groups.” Perhaps he forgot to ask the Hazaras. Nine of them were massacred by the “inclusive” Taliban last month in Ghazni. Or maybe the columnist hasn’t seen reports of terrified mothers throwing their toddlers over barbed fence at Kabul airport to US troops or desperate Afghans clinging to American airplanes during takeoff and plunging to their deaths. The morbidity of the situation, the misery and utter helplessness of ordinary Afghans and the panic among those who had helped US and NATO troops in their mission should have served as a reality check. Afghans don’t believe the sweet-talking Taliban because they know. But their predicament is offset by the self-delusion of the world outside. The Taliban won’t complain. The Taliban may still be committing necrophilia but this edition is more media savvy, tech-savvy, world-weary and at ease both on the battlefield and negotiating table. They are armed with a better media strategy and have learnt how to use social media or tap the right buttons to manipulate the narrative. If anything, Taliban 2.0 is more deceptive and cunning.

All they needed to do after capturing Kabul was to hold a press conference, where their secretive leader Zabihullah Mujahid emerged from the shadows to make all the right noises. Mujahid promised “full amnesty” to Afghans who worked for the western forces and the erstwhile Ashraf Ghani government, claimed private media will “remain independent”, vowed to “respect women’s rights”, promised to allow women to work and declared that Afghanistan wants peaceful relations with other nations and won’t become a base for global terror. One ‘emancipated’ Taliban member even allowed himself to be interviewed by a female journalist. But Afghan women are unconvinced. One female broadcaster told the Associated Press that “she was hiding at a relative’s house, too frightened to return home much less go to work. She said she and other women do not believe the Taliban have changed their ways. She spoke on condition of anonymity because she feared for her safety.” Even as the Taliban were busy hoodwinking the world, their fighters were yanking off women from bank jobs, asking local religious leaders for lists of girls over 15 years of age and widows under 45, going door-to-door to find targets and threaten family members, carrying out public executions and forced marriages in the interiors outside the purview of the cameras and the world, kidnapping journalists,  killing them and not sparing even their relatives. Since taking over Kabul, the predominantly Pashtun Taliban have carried out a stunning assault on ethnic Hazara minorities, opened fire on demonstrators who were protesting with the national flag, and issued ‘ death sentences’ against Afghan translators and family members. This hardly conforms to the image of a ‘reformed’ Taliban but due to geopolitical opportunism, lack of options and fearful of another refugee crisis, the world appears ready to take Taliban for their word. Pakistan, which has nursed and nurtured the Taliban back to health and now sees their geopolitical ambition fulfilled, does not need much convincing. China says that it is ready for a “friendly relations” with Taliban and has even hinted at providing cash-starved Taliban financial aid. Russia’s ambassador in Kabul, Dmitri Zhirnov, has said the Taliban “made a good impression on us… They’re decent guys, well armed.” Even in Iran, the predominantly Shiite nation that has bitter rivalry with the Pashtun, Sunni Taliban has welcomed their victory. Countries such as Pakistan, China, Russia or Iran have little interest in championing the cause of civil liberties or women’s rights in Afghanistan and see in American departure and Taliban’s rise an unprecedented geopolitical opportunity, yet the normative West, too, seems willing to give Taliban a second chance and an attempt at redemption. US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said: “This is not about trust; this is about verifying. And we’ll see what the Taliban end up doing in the days and weeks ahead.”  According to British prime minister Boris Johnson, the Taliban regime will be judged on its “actions, rather than by its words”. The Taliban press conference has made the French foreign minister “cautiously optimistic”. The memo from the West is that Taliban will be judged by their actions, not words — with a hidden message thrown in that if the Taliban refrains from open barbarism, global recognition won’t be eventually denied. The Taliban will take this. In fact, they are betting on it. The Taliban’s PR blitz is a ploy. The terrorist group has military and political power but is hamstrung due to lack of cash. The Joe Biden administration has frozen billions of dollars in Afghan reserves held in US bank accounts, depriving the Taliban of funds to run the country. The US-led IMF, too, has blocked access to its resources, including around $440 million in new monetary reserves under pressure from the US Treasury. Running a country that relies almost entirely on international support and donations, the Taliban is in dire need of money. It therefore serves the Taliban’s purpose to project moderation and build the narrative that it has “changed” to fool the gullible West. At home, the Taliban needs technocrats and bureaucrats to run the wheels of the government, and it has been employing the same officials who were part of the erstwhile Ghani government. Taliban’s assurances therefore must be taken with a healthy dose of scepticism. The ‘kindler, gentler, moderate’ approach cannot be a conviction, because the underlying Islamist, exclusivist, fundamentalist ideology that fuels the Taliban’s worldview hasn’t changed. The Taliban may show suitable pragmatism to gain external support, but it will never be a force of moderation because a ‘moderate’ Taliban leadership won’t survive. It will fall prey to internal struggles and become eventually unstable. The rush among certain quarters to give the Taliban a certificate of excellence or even a shot at redemption speaks less of the Taliban’s character (that in terms of available evidence hasn’t changed) and more of the naivete or opportunism of global and regional powers. The Taliban will see this as yet another vindication of their strategy. It has hoodwinked the world once by pretending to negotiate and attempting a ‘political settlement’ before it sprang a ‘military solution’. It is now trying to hoodwink the world twice by diplomatic tricks.