How to Talk to the Taliban

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Snapshot

Making Withdrawal Work

Scott Seward Smith

The looming U.S. drawdown in Afghanistan need not lead to instability. If it proceeds smartly, Washington can ensure that fewer U.S. soldiers will leave the country more secure, not less.

Snapshot

The Pakistani Taliban's Coming Divide

Barbara Elias-Sanborn

If confirmed, Mehsud's death could cause the Pakistani Taliban to break apart. Several actors, including the Pakistani government, the Afghan Taliban, and al Qaeda, appear ready to step in and mediate between factions. In every scenario, fighting terrorism in Afghanistan and Pakistan would become more difficult.

Members of the Kabul High Peace Council, May 2011. (isafmedia / flickr)

Afghan Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid's announcement last week that the group will open a political office in Qatar is part of a process that could bring a peaceful end to the war in Afghanistan. To be sure, naysayers abound both in the region and in Washington. But, conditions in 2012, unlike those in years past, offer a realistic, if difficult, opening for a way forward.

For more than two years, Washington, NATO, and the Afghan government have conducted a kind of one-sided courtship, trying to bring the Taliban leadership to the table. Before the January 2010 London Conference, Kabul adopted a doctrine professing that the Taliban leadership was predominantly moderate and, accordingly, that reconciliation would be a priority. Afghan President Hamid Karzai followed up by publicly inviting the Taliban to talk, stage-managing jirgas that reinforced his message and shoehorning veteran anti-Taliban mujahideen leaders into a "peace council." Tepid at first, Washington eventually got on board, too.

But the Taliban never came to the table. In fact, the ill-fated process produced some disastrous results. Even so, in private discussions I had with some Taliban leaders, they took quite pragmatic stances, laying out what real negotiations would look like; there were positive hints about the Taliban's willingness to talk, too, in the group's published communiqués. But the latest announcement is a game-changer. It is unambiguous confirmation that the Taliban is taking real steps toward serious political engagement and reconciliation.

A process that leads to a reconciliation in Afghanistan, before NATO troops go home, might sound too good to be true. It might be too good to be true, in fact. But its chances now are better than they have ever been before.

With the olive branch from the Taliban, of course, comes a demand. Zabiullah made it clear that the Taliban expects the United States to release some of its members who are currently being held in the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay. Washington's granting the request would be a classic confidence-building measure. Taliban rank and file are obsessively fascinated with the fate of detainees in American custody. If the Taliban leadership gets some of them back, it will be in a better position to justify engagement with the West to its followers and commanders. 

The Taliban often makes the point that the stronger power has to make the first gesture. In this case, a properly calibrated and sequenced prisoner release is a gambit that the strong power -- the United States -- can afford to make. Those released could be parked safely in Qatar with minimal risk of their somehow joining the insurgency. More important, Washington, at little cost, would be able to see whether the Taliban can deliver something useful in return for the United States' offering. Information recently leaked by Washington insiders indicates that the administration is already preparing the release of half a dozen or so former Taliban leaders. In other words, it, too, has calculated the overture to be worth it. This position is a world away from that of years past.

Also different is that now, in their own ways, both Kabul and Islamabad are on board. One of the working principles of peacemaking in Afghanistan is that any successful deal requires a Pakistani blessing. Afghan insurgents base their operations in Pakistan, and the hope is that, as part of a peace deal, Islamabad would remove such safe havens. After years of refusing, it might be ready to do so. Pakistan can rightly claim that it was one of the earliest voices calling for talks with the Taliban. For now, at least, its security agencies have refrained from creating obstacles in the way of the Qatar process and so seem confident that the process poses no threat to Pakistan.

Likewise, any deal that the Americans reached without the Afghan government's blessing would be worth little, as the government would have to be a principal in any cease-fire deal or eventual political deal. Of course, Karzai has a track record of mistrusting any initiative he feels he does not control directly. And Kabul has reason to suspect that the Taliban's opening a liaison office in Qatar is an attempt to loosen Karzai's grip over the Afghan political process. But for now, the regime has received enough reassurances -- or so it would seem, considering his willingness to go along.

Qatari participation changes the equation, too. Among Muslim countries, Qatar makes sense on a logistical level because that is where all the preparatory work took place, including the brainstorming sessions that generated the office idea and the early meetings with the Taliban's leadership envoy. More broadly, under the stewardship of the House of Thani, Qatar has emerged as a base for energetic, enlightened Sunni conservatism, qualities that resonate in Afghanistan. The Qatari leadership has shown that it can deftly handle controversial policies, such as, earlier this year, its support to the Libya opposition. That know-how could prove beneficial as Afghan reconciliation undoubtedly proves a bruising experience.