Since September 18, there have been seven bomb attacks in Afghanistan in about 48 hours, targeting the Taliban, agencies france-pressed. The Afghan ISKP group announced it had killed 35 Taliban members. The attacks occurred mainly in the Nangarhar province, and even the ISKP attacked a Taliban armed pickup truck nearby after the bomb ambushed a Taliban patrol car.
The Taliban are conducting a large-scale search of the area, arresting at least 40 suspects. At the same time, all 7 senior officials, including the governor of Nangarhar Province, the head of security and the commander of the police force, were dismissed.
In order to strengthen control, the Taliban appointed two more important figures, the first of which was the first senior commander to storm Kabul, Zakir, as deputy defense minister. Zakir, who fought with Omar in the 1990s, was the best field commander among the Taliban, and was later captured by U.S. forces in 2001 and imprisoned in the Guantanamo base prison.
In 2007, the United States released Zakir, and Zakir returned to Afghanistan. He later became an important commander of Mansour, the second-generation leader of the Taliban. Another appointment was the appointment of Sadr Ibrahim as Deputy Minister of the Interior. Both men were hardliners first and foremost, and secondly, both held military power and had their own elite main forces.
Most importantly, they are all mans of Mansour! There are three main factions in the Taliban, and the main figures of the Al-Mansour faction are Akhonzada, the third-generation leader of the Taliban, and Baradal, the new deputy prime minister. And their guns were in the hands of Zakir and Sadr. The other two major factions of the Taliban are Omar Jr. and Haqqani.
The Akhonzada and Baradar factions are deeply at odds with the Haqqani faction. According to media reports, they had many fierce quarrels, and even assistants came up to quarrel. Finally, Baradal went to Kandahar for a period of seclusion. Regarding the strength of the Taliban factions, the United States has a report in which it is estimated that the Al-Mansour faction has 28,000-40,000 soldiers, the Haqqani faction has 5,000 soldiers, and about 25,000-37,000 other Taliban troops are controlled by the Omar Faction Jr.
Zhdanov, chairman of the Russian branch of the International Police Association of Russian experts, said: In fact, the Taliban's roadside bombing technology was taught by the US CIA. Because, the Americans set up their own network of agents within the Taliban, recruiting some Taliban members for this purpose. Some of the core members of the Taliban may be agents recruited by the CIA. And the Russian expert specifically spoke of the appointment of Taliban Deputy Defense Minister Zakir, saying that the U.S. military released him in 2007, which is very inexplicable. Therefore, it is possible that the US military is plotting rebels.
Zakir has long been thought to be a possible defense minister, but this time he chose Omar Jr. as defense minister. After a week of arguments and quarrels, Zakir was able to become deputy defense minister, probably for a variety of reasons. However, Zakyr has a heavy army, and no one in the various factions of the Taliban dares to ignore it.
Now, of course, the Taliban's first priority is to eliminate the ISKP, otherwise it will be difficult to attract foreign investment to develop mines and transportation. The Taliban are indeed first-rate masters of guerrilla warfare in the mountains and in social organization in the countryside. However, there is a lack of equipment to conduct counter-guerrilla warfare, such as surveillance systems, identification systems, reconnaissance equipment, and so on.
The most troublesome thing now is that in the past the Taliban were barefoot, and now the Taliban are wearing shoes. As the ruler, the Taliban must also set up many checkpoints, dispatch many patrols at regular intervals, and have logistic convoys. These were the targets of roadside bombs, which the Taliban used to attack U.S. and Afghan troops for 20 years.
The situation in Afghanistan is overly complex and mountainous, with regions geographically isolated. Even the Taliban have no complete control over areas outside Pashtun and remote tribal areas. It is very difficult to completely eliminate all kinds of armed groups.